The biggest news in sports betting circles, or, if you believe the prediction markets operators, “commodities trading,” is Kalshi getting kicked out of Massachusetts.

State Superior Court Justice Christopher K. Barry-Smith issued a preliminary injunction on January 20, 2026, “prohibiting Kalshi from offering sports-related event contracts in the absence of the required license” under Massachusetts’s sports betting laws.  This lasted about five days.  Since stopping Kalshi cold would impact existing bets – I mean trades – that Kalshi has already taken from the Commonwealth’s residents, the company and Attorney General Andrea Campbell were given a couple more weeks to work it out.  If and when they don’t, Justice Barry-Smith will have a hearing, and at least temporarily, put Kalshi out of business in Massachusetts.

And this, right before the SuperBowl.

My prediction:  Kalshi will then immediately ask the Justice to continue to put the preliminary injunction on hold while they take an appeal, which he will not do.  Then it will file an emergency writ to the Massachusetts Court of Appeals to stay the preliminary injunction.  Because the decision and injunction are clearly correct, the Appeals Court will not save Kalshi.  And neither will the Massachusetts Supreme Court.

But the Supreme Court of the United States might.  

In dozens of cases where President Donald Trump has been violating the law, like sending federal troops into cities “to prevent crime,” trial courts have issued preliminary injunctions ordering him to stop.  Courts of appeal have almost without exception upheld those lower court orders.  

But the Republican majority on the SCOTUS has, more often than not, overturned the preliminary injunctions, without even giving a reason.  This is called “the shadow docket.”  This has never happened before.  Before Trump became president the Supreme Court would rarely even consider a preliminary injunction, and would almost never overrule trial judges, who had heard days and weeks of testimony.

I asked a friend of Chief Justice John Roberts – the three of us were classmates at Harvard Law School – what was going on.  Roberts is too smart to think Trump’s actions were legal.  His friend replied, “John is a conservative Catholic.  But he got where he is by always counting votes.”  When Republicans had a 5 to 4 majority, Roberts could work out a compromise to protect his reputation.  The best example is when he pulled a legal doctrine out of the air to prevent the destruction of Obamacare.

But Republicans now have a 6 to 3 majority.  Even if Roberts voted with the three liberal Democrats, they would still lose 5 to 4.

So, to avoid the humiliation of being the only Chief Justice always on the losing side, Roberts gets the other conservative justices to agree to give Trump his wins, but without making binding precedents.  Technically, the Court is only overturning preliminary injunctions.  There may be trials years from now and trial courts issuing permanent injunctions, which can be examined without even mentioning the overturned preliminary injunction.  There might also be one or two new Democratic justices.  More importantly, Trump will be gone by then, and Roberts and the others will no longer have to fear whatever it is they seem to fear. 

I believe there is at least a 50-50 chance that SCOTUS will allow Kalshi and its competitors to survive for another few years.  

Trump and his allies will be putting a lot of pressure on the justices.  Last January Donald J. Trump, Jr., announced that he had become a paid strategic adviser to Kalshi.  One of his father’s first acts as president was naming as Acting Chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission Caroline D. Pham, who had been the subject of allegations of ethical violations but was a fan of sports futures markets.  A few months later she quit to join a cryptocurrency firm.  Trump then named Brian Quintenz, a member of Kalshi’s Board of Directors to head the agency that decides whether Kalshi is legal. And Eliezer Mishory, the company’s top lawyer, quit Kalshi to lead the Department of Government Efficiency, the infamous DOGE, at the US Securities and Exchange Commission.

Of course, there is always the chance that SCOTUS will actually hear the case.  Kalshi’s arguments are so weak that a majority of even this Court would rule that betting on which team will win a football game is not trading in commodities.  Then, counting votes, the Chief Justice will be able to join the legally correct side.