Utah Attorney General Derek Brown on Wednesday filed criminal charges against the prediction market Kalshi and two of its executives, alleging illegal online gambling promotion, according to Al Jazeera. The Kalshi Utah charges name CEO Tarek Mansour and COO Luana Lopes Lara as well as the company.
The filing came a day after the Trump administration sued the state to block its civil enforcement actions against Kalshi, according to Al Jazeera. The case is part of a federal-state dispute over who regulates prediction markets.
According to the criminal complaint filed in a Salt Lake City court, Kalshi facilitated an undercover law enforcement officer’s wagers on sports events, including NFL games, according to Al Jazeera. The charges follow an August federal ruling that Utah was entitled to enforce its anti-gambling laws against online prediction markets, Al Jazeera reports.
The charges are felonies that carry the possibility of jail time, according to ABC News US. The attorney general’s office did not immediately say what penalties it would seek.
Brown said, "Gambling is illegal in Utah, whether you place the bet, run the game, or promote it," and that being federally registered does not put a company above the law, according to the Guardian. Kalshi called the charges a "crazy overreach" and said "Utah is clearly playing politics." The company said it looks forward to "putting a stop to this in court," the Guardian reports.
The reports differ on the number of counts. Al Jazeera reports 12 counts of online gambling promotion, one count of general gambling promotion and one count of pattern of unlawful activity. The Guardian and ABC News US report 13 counts of violating the state’s gambling prohibition plus one charge involving profiting from illegal activity.
The charges come as Utah’s constitution explicitly bars lawmakers from legalising gambling, and the state has some of the strictest prohibitions in the US, according to Al Jazeera. Arizona earlier this year became the first state to file criminal charges against Kalshi, accusing it of operating an illegal gambling business, ABC News US reports. The Guardian reports that litigation over who regulates prediction markets has spread across roughly 20 states, and analysts say the US Supreme Court will likely settle the issue.
The case proceeds in Salt Lake City court, where Kalshi says it will fight the charges. Legal analyst Daniel Wallach expects more states to bring similar cases, and the US Supreme Court is widely expected to settle the jurisdiction question.
The available reporting is limited to three articles, and the criminal complaint itself was not reviewed, so the counts are known only from those reports. The sources do not give the penalties the state will seek or a court date. Neither Mansour nor Lara has publicly responded to the charges, and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission has not been reported as responding to them.
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This article was written with AI assistance from the published reporting listed above. It is part of the World Brief daily news podcast.