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New Mexico has a stormy gambling history. When the IGRA was signed by the House in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it seemed like New Mexico might be one of the states to get on the Native casino craze. Politics guaranteed that would not be the situation.

The New Mexico governor Bruce King announced a working group in Nineteen Ninety to create a contract with New Mexico Amerindian bands. When the panel arrived at an accord with two prominent local bands a year later, Governor King declined to sign the agreement. He held up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.

When a new governor took over in 1995, it seemed that American Indian wagering in New Mexico was a certainty. But when the new Governor passed the accord with the Indian tribes, anti-gambling forces were able to tie the contract up in courts. A New Mexico court found that the Governor had overstepped his bounds in signing the compact, therefore denying the state of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing revenues over the next several years.

It required the CNA, signed by the New Mexico house, to get the process moving on a full compact between the Government of New Mexico and its Native tribes. A decade had been burned for gambling in New Mexico, which includes Indian casino Bingo.

The nonprofit Bingo business has grown from Nineteen Ninety-Nine. In that year, New Mexico non-profit game owners acquired just $3,048 in revenues. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed one million dollars in revenues in 2001. Nonprofit Bingo revenues have grown steadily since that time. 2005 witnessed the greatest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the operators.

Bingo is apparently favored in New Mexico. All sorts of operators look for a bit of the pie. With hope, the politicians are done batting around gambling as an important factor like they did in the 90's. That's probably wishful thinking.