Illinois racing interests are seeking to pressure the state government in a last-ditch effort to pressure Churchill Downs Inc. to keep racing in Illinois Arlington International Racecourse.
The most recent offer essentially sees the pending and future CDI license applications being held hostage by CDI in an attempt to find a favorable solution to the Arlington situation.
Former Governor Jim Edgar, a longtime owner and breeder, is the last to add his voice to the choir. In an interview with the Arlington Heights Daily Herald published May 30, Edgar asked Governor JB Pritzker to step in, using CDI’s offer to leverage more casino business in Illinois.
This followed a request from the Illinois Thoroughbred Horsemen’s Association a few days earlier that the Illinois Attorney General open an antitrust investigation into the matter.
CDI has opened a bid to sell the property in Arlington, including its iconic cantilevered roof grandstand, to sell the property for redevelopment. This follows the surprise decision in 2019 not to apply for a newly approved casino license for the track – a move that dashed riders’ hopes for a renewal of racing in the state.
Photo: Coady Photography
CDI has a controlling interest in Rivers Casino, the most successful in the state, located less than 15 miles from Arlington. The Louisville, Kentucky company is also applying for a new casino license in Waukegan, Illinois, and has shown its first interest in the Illinois gaming crown jewel – a Chicago-planned casino that will license satellite slot machines at the city’s airports.
Chicago Casino has been blocked for several reasons but is now back on track. The Illinois Gaming Board has deliberately considered offers for Waukegan and has not set a target date for the selection of a successful bidder. Edgar told the Daily Herald these uses could give Pritzker leverage.
“When licensing you have to consider what is in the best interests of the state,” said the former governor. “And if a company hasn’t really done what’s in the best interests of the state, I’m not sure why you would keep giving them more licenses …
“Churchill is still trying to get additional licenses for casinos in the state, so I think the state has influence over them,” Edgar said.
Edgar lamented the board’s approval of CDI’s acquisition of a majority stake in Rivers Casino, saying the state should have “at least received some assurances that they would not give up horse racing altogether. That is unfortunate.”
The Illinois Gaming Board and Illinois Racing Board are separate entities. Until a massive gambling expansion law was passed in 2019 – the law that approved Racinos – the game board was not subject to racing regulations and had no reason to consider racing interests.
Photo: Coady Photography
Edgar, a Republican, was a member of the Pritzker transition team in 2018. He said the Democratic governor, who appoints members of both bodies with the approval of the Senate, is the only logical source of pressure on CDI.
“It has to come from the governor’s office,” he told the newspaper’s Christopher Placek. “That just didn’t happen, I don’t believe what I can see. And the governor knows about races … He understands. He understands Churchill.”
The former governor also indicated that Arlington’s death would go on Hawthorne Racetrack the only track in the Chicago area with Thoroughbred and Standardbred interests that is probably left to fight for dates there. 2019 legislation approved the construction of a new racino, specifically for harness racing, in the suburbs of south Chicago. Ironically, Pritzker torpedoed this project by refusing to sell the state land on which it was to be built.
Edgar was governor from 1991 to 1999. He was involved in a family breeding and racing operation during his tenure, operated primarily in Indiana to avoid conflicts of interest, and occasionally spotted his horses running during afternoon programs at an OTB in the Chicago Loop.
Neither the governor’s office nor the attorney general’s office have commented on the questions they are interfering with.