Bonta Defends State Gambling Laws Against Kalshi for the Tenth and Eleventh Time
California Attorney General Rob Bonta announced on November 6 that California joined two bipartisan coalitions of attorneys general in filing two amicus briefs in support of New York and Wisconsin's right to enforce state sports gaming and gambling laws against prediction market operator Kalshi. The filings mark the tenth and eleventh time California has joined multistate amicus efforts targeting Kalshi and similar prediction market companies.
"We are seeing more and more young people being preyed upon by addictive gaming platforms and it is time for states to join together to protect our youth. This filing is representative of our bipartisan commitment to protecting state regulatory authority over illegal, unregulated gambling operations," Bonta said. "Prediction markets cannot use federal loopholes to bypass state consumer protection, sports gaming, and gambling laws. By joining this brief, we stand firmly with Wisconsin, New York, and our state partners to ensure that federal commodities laws are not weaponized to evade state laws, fuel gambling addiction, and undermine state regulation of legal gaming."
The attorneys general primarily argue that federal preemption of state gambling laws as applied to prediction market providers is improper and detrimental to the traditional role of states to regulate gambling and protect vulnerable citizens.
In the New York case, KalshiEX, LLC v. Williams, et al, Kalshi sued the New York State Gaming Commission after the Commission sent a cease-and-desist order to Kalshi. The district court denied Kalshi's preliminary injunction motion, holding that New York gambling laws as applied to Kalshi's sports-event contracts are not preempted, and Kalshi has appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. The Wisconsin case, Commodity Futures Trading Commission v. State of Wisconsin, arose out of Wisconsin's state-court action against Coinbase, Kalshi, Robinhood, Polymarket, and Crypto.com; after the cases were moved to federal court, the CFTC filed its own federal lawsuit and a motion for a preliminary injunction to block the state from enforcing its gambling laws, which the district court denied, and the CFTC has appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. Bonta joined the attorneys general of dozens of states, including Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas and Colorado, in filing the briefs.
(Source: California Attorney General's Office)
Source: California Attorney General's Office
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：加州总检察长罗布·邦塔官方肖像。Douglas Despres 摄，加州总检察长办公室，公共领域，经 Wikimedia Commons。 / Photo: Official portrait of California Attorney General Rob Bonta. Photo by Douglas Despres, California Attorney General's Office, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
