New Mexico has a complex gambling background. When the IGRA was passed by the House in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it seemed like New Mexico might be one of the states to get on the Amerindian casino bandwagon. Politics guaranteed that wouldn’t be the case.

The New Mexico governor Bruce King appointed a working group in 1990 to create a compact with New Mexico Indian tribes. When the working group came to an accord with two big local tribes a year later, Governor King refused to sign the bargain. He would hold up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.

When a new governor took over in Nineteen Ninety Five, it appeared that Indian betting in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson signed the accord with the Amerindian tribes, anti-gaming groups were able to tie the accord up in the courts. A New Mexico court found that Governor Johnson had overstepped his bounds in signing a deal, therefore costing the government of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing fees over the next several years.

It required the Compact Negotiation Act, passed by the New Mexico government, to get the process moving on a full accord amongst the Government of New Mexico and its Indian tribes. A decade had been squandered for gambling in New Mexico, including Native casino Bingo.

The non-profit Bingo business has gotten bigger from 1999. That year, New Mexico not for profit game providers brought in only $3,048. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed one million dollars in 2001. Nonprofit Bingo revenues have grown steadily since then. 2005 witnessed the largest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the operators.

Bingo is categorically favored in New Mexico. All kinds of operators look for a piece of the action. Hopefully, the politicos are done batting around gambling as a hot button factor like they did in the 1990’s. That’s probably wishful thinking.