Case 3:25-cv-02016-VDO Document 56-1 Filed 01/16/26 Page 23 of 29
restrictions on this authority, IGRA still broadly advances tribes’ “exclusive right to regulate [and offer] gaming activity” (including sports betting) on their Indian lands as a means of promoting tribal economic development and self-determination. See 25 U.S.C. §§ 2701(5), 2702(2); W. Flagler , 71 F.4th at 1062–63. And later-enacted statutes of general applicability— like the CEA—cannot repeal earlier-enacted legislation that is specifically designed to advance the United States’ special relationship with tribes—such as IGRA—without a clear statement from Congress. See, e.g., Mancari , 417 U.S. at 550. Accordingly, because regulating gaming (including sports betting) has long been a traditional state and tribal power, Kalshi must show clear congressional language overturning federal policy. But it cannot because no such language exists. Rather, the CEA actually reinforces the federal policy in favor of state gaming regulation by disclaiming preemption of state gaming laws. See 7 U.S.C. § 16(e). And nothing in the definition of “swap” indicates that Congress meant to overturn the entire field of sports-betting regulation or Indian gaming. Second, sports betting has a “unique place in American history and society,” and therefore its own “political history.” See FDA v. Brown & Williamson , 529 U.S. 120, 159–60 (2000), superseded by statute 21 U.S.C. § 387 et seq . Given this social and political history, at the time of the 2010 CEA amendments, Congress had already “for better or for worse, … created a distinct regulatory scheme” for sports betting—namely, PASPA. Id. The conflict between Kalshi’s argument that the CEA’s 2010 amendments authorized sports betting nationwide and the existence of PASPA’s nationwide sports-betting prohibition in 2010 therefore indicates that Congress could not have intended to regulate sports betting in the way that Kalshi now claims. “Given this history and the breadth of the authority that [Kalshi] has asserted [the CFTC has],” this Court should not defer to Kalshi’s “expansive construction” of the CEA. Id. at 160.
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