Poker Writer
A new tribal casino resort in Texas, set to open in 2028, will be the largest in the state. The Alabama-Coushatta Tribe of Texas broke ground on the new casino in June with big hopes for the site. A local report framed it as a property awash in “Las Vegas glitz.”
The same architects behind Connecticut’s Foxwoods are designing the new Naskila Resort and Casino. It is the largest hotel-casino development in North America, with over 2,000 rooms. While Foxwoods is a Northeast poker landmark, the new Texas property won’t have a room due to regulatory reasons.
The 95-acre site is near the town of Leggett, 80 miles north of Houston. The casino resort site will reportedly span 12 football fields and host a multi-story 366-room hotel with a resort-style pool complex. It will also have an event and conference center. The casino is slated to have a massive gaming floor with 3,400 machines.
Keep Reading
Big Texas Casino a Long Time Coming For the Tribe
The Alabama-Coushatta Tribe is one of just three tribes in Texas federally recognized to operate casinos in one of the strictest anti-gambling states in the country. For a long time, Texas officials blocked efforts from the tribe to build a casino on its 11,000-acre reservation.
But in 2022, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the state could not restrict reservation gambling, as that falls under federal jurisdiction. That opened the door to tribal gaming, albeit in a restricted manner.
The Alabama-Coushatta Tribe already runs the Naskila Casino in Livingston, about nine miles south of the new site in Leggett. It is currently unknown if the casino in Livingston will continue to run once the new, larger one opens in Leggett. That seems unlikely, considering their proximity.
The new resort complex is expected to be completed in stages, with the finishing touches in late 2028.
That said, casino projects sometimes tend to lag behind planned timelines. Bally’s has fallen behind schedule on a number of projects in the U.S. Internationally, Wynn is running into ongoing region-specific difficulties in its Middle East project.
No Vegas-style games, Including Poker
The tribal casinos in Texas are heavily restricted in the gaming options they can offer. They can only provide Class II gaming, which excludes Vegas-style games like blackjack, poker, slot machines, or table games.
Slot-like machines do operate on Class II gaming floors. While these machines look and feel like slots, bingo-based functionality drives them.
The other tribal casinos in Texas include one in Eagle Pass run by the Kickapoo Tribe and the El Paso-based Tribe, the Ysleta del Sur Pueblo.
Image Credit: Larry D. Moore / Wikimedia Commons (image) (license)
