The U.S. Supreme Court has officially been asked to weigh in on the rise of sports-related prediction markets.
New Jersey filed a petition for writ of certiorari to the Supreme Court on Wednesday, just ahead of the latest deadline the state was facing to seek such a review.
"Companies like Kalshi claim to offer legal sports betting in all 50 States, but they refuse to follow the gambling laws of any State," New Jersey Attorney General Jennifer Davenport said in a press release. "We’re calling on the Supreme Court to resolve this issue and recognize that Congress did not silently make the sports-betting industry immune from state law."
BREAKING: NJ Attorney General files certiorari petition with SCOTUS for court to hear sports prediction market case.
— Nick Devor (@nickdevor_) September 2, 2026
However SCOTUS rules, it could have massive consequences for the fast-growing business of prediction markets.
Those exchanges, regulated by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), are offering sports-related event contracts for trading all over the U.S. In doing so, they point to federal legislation and regulation they claim exclusively governing them, not state-level gambling laws.
That has created a massive battle in the courts over the legality of sports event contracts. Many states see sports-related prediction markets as merely sports betting.
The New Jersey sports betting regulators failed in April to get the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit to overturn a lower-court decision to grant Kalshi a preliminary injunction against the Garden State.
However, another federal appeals court, for the Ninth Circuit, sided last week against Kalshi in a similar debate involving the legality of the exchange's sports-related event contracts.
Are you there, SCOTUS? It's us, everybody: pic.twitter.com/VAwC0Og6iO
— Geoff Zochodne (@GeoffZochodne) September 2, 2026
New Jersey noted that at least 20 states are involved in prediction market-related litigation, and that there is now an “irreconcilable split” between federal appeals courts.
“That split has tremendous importance, as it will determine whether a multi-billion-dollar gaming industry can suddenly operate free from state sports-gaming laws,” New Jersey’s petition says. “And given the deep errors made by the Third Circuit … certiorari is urgently needed.”
More to come.
