Case 3:25-cv-02016-VDO Document 56-1 Filed 01/16/26 Page 20 of 29
reservation online gaming. See Mohegan Agreement at 1; Mashantucket Pequot Agreement at 1. IGRA, therefore, clearly recognizes tribes’ authority to regulate internet gaming. Kalshi also argues that the Unlawful Internet Gaming Enforcement Act (“UIGEA”), not tribal-state IGRA agreements or state gaming law, solely governs the online gaming aspect of its sports-betting contracts, and UIGEA excludes DCM transactions from its definition of “bet or wager.” See Pl. Memo. Supp. Prelim. Inj. at 17–18, ECF No. 30-1. By claiming that the exclusion for DCM transactions from the definition of “bet or wager” in 31 U.S.C. § 5362 “underscores” Congress’s intent to preempt all state (and tribal) gaming laws via the CEA, Kalshi implies that UIGEA also somehow preempts IGRA and all tribal-state IGRA agreements. Id. But this ignores UIGEA’s own language that “[n]o provision of this subchapter shall be construed as altering, limiting, or extending any Federal or State law or Tribal-State compact prohibiting, permitting, or regulating gambling within the United States.” 31 U.S.C. § 5361(b). UIGEA “prevents using the internet to circumvent existing state and federal gambling laws, but it does not create any additional substantive prohibitions.” California v. Iipay Nation of Santa Ysabel , 898 F.3d 960, 965 (9th Cir. 2018). While UIGEA may provide insight as to what the term “sports betting” generally means, its statutory exceptions should not be imported wholesale into IGRA. See 152 Cong. Rec. H8029–30 (daily ed. Sep. 29, 2006) (statement of Rep. Leach) (explaining UIGEA’s definition of a “bet or wager” does not change the principle that “if a person on tribal lands plays a gambling game with a state-based gambling business, the game must not violate tribal law”). II. The Major Questions Doctrine Forecloses Kalshi’s Theory. In 2010, federal law—namely, the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act (“PASPA”)—prohibited sports betting nationwide. Kalshi’s position thus requires interpreting the CEA not only to eradicate state and federal gaming laws by preemption or implied repeal, but
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