LAS VEGAS – Former National Indian Gaming Commission Chairman Phil Hogen announced at the recently concluded Global Gaming Expo in Las Vegas that he will be affiliating with Jacobson Buffalo Magnuson Anderson & Hogen, PC, a Saint Paul, Minn.-based law firm with a national Indian-law practice.

In October, Hogen, who was the longest-serving chair of the federal agency that provides oversight of the $26 billion Indian gaming industry, concluded 25 years of federal service, including his seven years as NIGC chair, over three years as an NIGC commissioner and vice chair, and 10 years as the U.S. Attorney for South Dakota. Before becoming NIGC chair in 2002, Hogen also served as the associate solicitor for Indian Affairs at the Department of the Interior.

“The breadth and depth of Phil Hogen’s experience will serve our clients well,” Henry Buffalo, the firm’s managing shareholder said at the G2E conference. “He is a good match for our firm’s philosophy, which is to provide sophisticated legal services in a wide variety of Indian-law settings, from elaborate business transactions to complex litigation to day-to-day tribal governance.”

In the G2E Show editions of Indian Gaming and Casino Enterprise Management, Hogen reflected on some of the achievements and challenges at NIGC during his service there, in articles entitled “Looking Back: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly,” and “NIGC By the Numbers.”

Hogen is a member of the Oglala Sioux Tribe of the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota. He earned his law degree at the University of South Dakota (1970), and his undergraduate degree at Augustana College in Sioux Falls, S.D. in 1967. Phil and his wife, Marty, will continue to make their home in the Black Hills of South Dakota. Their daughter, Vanya, is a named shareholder in the firm, and their son Herb lives in Missoula, Mont.

Hogen joins the firm in an Of Counsel capacity and his practice is expected to focus on intergovernmental relations, tribal gaming and gaming regulation and oversight.

Jacobson Buffalo Magnuson Anderson & Hogen P.C., a majority Indian-owned law firm, was founded in 1983, enjoys a national reputation for excellence in providing legal services to Indian tribes and their business partners on Indian-law issues. More information can be found at the firm’s Web site.