- Connecticut’s complaint accuses Kalshi of letting minors open accounts and paying underage promoters on TikTok and X.
- The suit cites Kalshi’s own federal court filing that put sports contracts at 80% to 90% of its offerings in February.
- A Connecticut federal judge rejected Kalshi’s derivatives defense on Aug. 7, a ruling the new state complaint invokes directly.
- Kalshi offered wagers on Connecticut college teams including UConn and Yale, which state law excludes from betting.
HARTFORD, Conn. – Connecticut sued KalshiEX LLC in Hartford Superior Court on Aug. 26, seeking to block the prediction-market operator from taking any further sports wagers from state residents and to force it to give up every dollar those wagers generated.
The State’s Claims
Attorney General William Tong filed the verified complaint at the request of Department of Consumer Protection Commissioner Bryan Cafferelli, asking the court for a permanent injunction under the state’s gambling-license statute plus three counts under the Connecticut Unfair Trade Practices Act covering illegal wagering, underage gambling and deceptive advertising. The state wants Kalshi to disgorge all revenue it collected from Connecticut bettors or, alternatively, to pay the taxes and fees a licensed operator would have owed.
Connecticut’s licensed sportsbooks pay 13.75% of gross gaming revenue to the state, 2% of which funds youth sports grants in distressed municipalities, and licensees must separately contribute $500,000 a year to gambling-treatment programs.
“Sports event contracts are no different than sports betting and are not magically shielded by federal law from Connecticut’s commonsense consumer protection laws,” Tong said in a statement announcing the suit.
Built On Kalshi’s Own Numbers
A central piece of the complaint’s evidence comes from Kalshi itself. In a separate federal case in the same district, the company told the U.S. District Court for the District of Connecticut that between 80% and 90% of its offerings were sports event contracts as of February. That same court, ruling Aug. 7, rejected Kalshi’s argument that its sports contracts are federally regulated derivatives, finding they are, in the court’s words, “sports wagers” subject to state law.
The new complaint notes that nine other state or federal courts – in Maryland, Nevada, Massachusetts, Washington, Michigan, New York, Ohio, Arizona and Utah – plus the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, have reached the same conclusion, part of Connecticut’s broader prediction-markets enforcement fight that began when the Department of Consumer Protection sent cease-and-desist letters in December.
Minors And Banned College Teams
The complaint alleges Kalshi lets users as young as 18 open accounts, three years under the 21-year-old minimum Connecticut sets for sports wagering, and that paid promoters, including a 15-year-old video game streamer briefly engaged as an affiliate on the platform X, advertised the company to underage audiences. It also cites a 2025 post promoting a “Kalshi Ambassador Program” aimed at Yale University and other Connecticut colleges.
The complaint also names six in-state programs whose single games appeared on the platform, from UConn and Yale to Sacred Heart, the University of New Haven, Fairfield and Quinnipiac. Connecticut law strikes every one of those schools from the definition of a sporting event open to wagering. Connecticut’s licensed operators, among the online gambling sites for USA players the state actually regulates, are barred from the same bets.
What Comes Next
Connecticut follows New York, whose attorney general filed a $36 billion case against Kalshi’s sports markets in late July, in seeking to shut down the company’s sports contracts through state court rather than federal regulators. The case carries a Sept. 15 return date in Hartford Superior Court, and Kalshi has separately appealed the Aug. 7 federal ruling to the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.