Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill said she sued Kalshi, Polymarket, Robinhood and seven other prediction-market platforms on Thursday, and a Tangipahoa Parish judge signed a temporary restraining order the same day ordering the companies to stop offering event contracts to anyone in the state. The order sets up a preliminary-injunction hearing for November 30, while Kalshi has already fired back in federal court arguing Louisiana has no authority to touch its business at all.
A Lawsuit Naming Ten Platforms
Murrill said her office filed suit against Kalshi, Robinhood, Polymarket, Forecastex, Crypto.com, Coinbase, Novig, Underdog, Gemini and Prophetx, according to The Block. “I am seeking an immediate restraining order and an injunction to restore the rule of law in Louisiana,” Murrill said. Per NOLA.com, Tangipahoa Parish Judge Jeffrey Johnson signed a temporary restraining order prohibiting the companies from facilitating event contracts for anyone located in Louisiana, a copy of which Murrill posted on X Thursday evening. Court records were not immediately available that evening, the outlet reported, and NOLA.com staff writer Patrick Sloan-Turner noted that Kalshi users in Louisiana could still buy an event contract on the platform as of 7 p.m. Thursday.
Dueling Arguments Over Gambling Versus Swaps
Murrill argues event contracts are wagers that must be regulated by the state, saying prediction markets are gambling and that companies cannot invent new terms to evade state gambling laws. She added that unlicensed gaming operators are illegal and that illegal gambling can result in jail time and significant penalties, and said judges across the country have called prediction-market activity gambling. Kalshi and Polymarket counter that event contracts are financial products, not gambling, and fall under federal rather than state regulation. Neither Kalshi nor Polymarket responded immediately to requests for comment from the same report.
Jovy Dedaj, Kalshi's head of litigation, said federally regulated exchanges are exclusively governed by the federal government, and argued that people benefit from free and fair markets. Dedaj also said Kalshi has faced anticompetitive litigation aimed at removing consumer choice from Wall Street to New Orleans. Kalshi had already sued Murrill and other Louisiana officials in federal court on October 23, according to VitalLaw, which reported that KalshiEX LLC sought to stop state gambling and sports-wagering laws from being applied to its event contracts in both Louisiana and Missouri. The company argues federal law gives the Commodity Futures Trading Commission exclusive jurisdiction over swaps traded on designated contract markets, and that its sports event contracts qualify as swaps.
Competing Filings in Federal Court
Kalshi filed its own request for a restraining order against Murrill and others in federal court Thursday, after Louisiana's state lawsuit was filed, per The Block's reporting. A federal judge had not ruled on that request as of the report. The timing underscores how the two sides are now racing each other through separate court systems — Murrill pursuing state gambling claims in Tangipahoa Parish, Kalshi pressing federal preemption arguments in its own filing.
A National Pattern Across Roughly 20 States
Louisiana is now the 11th state to sue one or more prediction markets, per The Block, and more than a dozen states have taken legal action against Kalshi, Polymarket and similar companies. Litigation has spread across roughly 20 states, creating what analysts describe to NBC News as a fragmented legal landscape likely to end up before the U.S. Supreme Court. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission, claiming sole authority to regulate platforms like Kalshi and Polymarket, has sued Arizona, Connecticut, Illinois, Kentucky, Minnesota, New Mexico, New York, Rhode Island, Utah and Wisconsin, according to Ars Technica.
The appellate track record so far has largely favored the states. The Second Circuit upheld lower-court rulings rejecting Kalshi's bids to block gambling laws in New York and Connecticut, the outlet reported, while a Sixth Circuit panel ruled unanimously against Kalshi in a dispute involving Ohio and Tennessee in September. Kalshi did notch a win in April, when the Third Circuit found the company's sports-related event contracts are swaps traded on a CFTC-licensed designated contract market, meaning New Jersey could not regulate them.
Utah and Arizona Show How Far States Have Gone
Other states have gone beyond civil suits. Utah filed criminal charges against Kalshi and two of its executives in late October, including 13 counts of violating the state's gambling prohibition and an additional charge involving profiting off illegal activity, NBC News reported. Utah Attorney General Derek Brown's office also filed a civil lawsuit alleging similar violations and said it had conducted an undercover investigation before bringing the criminal charges. Arizona became the first state to file criminal charges against Kalshi earlier this year, accusing it of operating an illegal gambling business within its borders, per the same NBC News report.
Washington Attorney General Nick Brown sued Kalshi in March over alleged violations of state gambling and consumer protection laws, and Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin has accused the company of offering gambling to people as young as 18 and failing to pay taxes or comply with other state restrictions, according to Ars Technica. For now, Louisiana's fight joins that growing docket, with the preliminary-injunction hearing set for November 30 standing as the next concrete checkpoint in a dispute that neither side shows any sign of backing away from.
