Is sports betting legal in Minnesota?
No. No Minnesota statute authorizes sports betting, online or in person, and Minn. Stat. 609.76, subd. 2 makes sports bookmaking a felony. The 11 tribal nations run 20 casinos under compacts that cover only blackjack and video games of chance, so none of them has a sportsbook. A 2026 law making it a felony to operate a prediction market has been blocked by a federal court since July 27, 2026 for platforms the CFTC has registered as designated contract markets.
Why it isn't legal yet
Most bills since 2022 would have given the 11 tribes exclusive licenses, and each has stalled over what the state's two horse tracks, Canterbury Park and Running Aces, get in return. Republicans have pushed for track licenses or a share of the tax, and DFL sponsors have written their bills around tribal exclusivity. Senators from both parties, including John Marty, Erin Maye Quade and Jordan Rasmusson, have voted or argued against the bills over problem gambling, so no version has had the votes to pass both chambers.
The history of sports betting law in Minnesota
The constitution, the lottery and the compacts (1945 to 1991)
The Legislature legalized bingo in 1945, and as late as 1984 Gov. Rudy Perpich's office still called bingo "the only major form of gambling that is legal in Minnesota." Voters approved a constitutional amendment for on-track pari-mutuel betting on November 2, 1982 (Minn. Const. art. X, sec. 8), and a 1983 law created the Minnesota Racing Commission. In 1988 the Legislature put a lottery amendment on the ballot (Laws 1988, ch. 690), and voters approved it that November, 59% to 41%. Article XIII, section 5 now bars the Legislature from authorizing any lottery other than one the state operates. Laws 1989, ch. 334 set up the Minnesota State Lottery, which sold its first ticket on April 18, 1990.
Congress passed the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act in 1988. Minnesota answered with Laws 1989, ch. 44 (now Minn. Stat. 3.9221), which directs the governor to negotiate compacts and keeps each one in force until it's renegotiated or replaced. Perpich signed the first seven video-game compacts in October 1989. The Department of Public Safety says Minnesota's tribes were the first in the country to sign gaming compacts with a state. Perpich signed two more before his term ended in 1991, and Gov. Arne Carlson signed the last two that year. Blackjack compacts followed the Lower Sioux case described below. Today the state holds 22 compacts with the 11 tribes.
According to a 2005 House Research history, the compacts don't guarantee the tribes exclusivity and don't stop the Legislature from legalizing gambling off tribal land. A 1990 law reclassified video games of chance as illegal gambling devices, which confines slot machines to the reservations. In 1999 the Legislature let Canterbury Park, and any later track after a full season of live racing, run a card club with unbanked games.
Bills after Murphy (2019 to 2022)
The Supreme Court struck down the federal sports betting ban in Murphy v. NCAA on May 14, 2018. Sen. Roger Chamberlain's SF 1894 cleared one Senate committee in March 2019 and got an informational hearing in March 2020, where the Minnesota Indian Gaming Association (MIGA) opposed it. HF 778, introduced February 4, 2021 and led by Rep. Zack Stephenson in 2022, passed the House 70 to 57 on May 12, 2022. It gave each tribe an online sportsbook, allowed retail betting at tribal casinos and taxed mobile revenue at 10%. A Senate committee added licenses for the two tracks on May 19, and the Senate never voted before the session ended May 22.
2023 to 2026
Stephenson's HF 2000 and Sen. Matt Klein's SF 1949 carried the tribal-exclusive model through 2023, with Klein amending his version to send 30% of the tax to the tracks. Speaker Melissa Hortman said in May 2023 the session had run out of time. In 2024 the bills carried over, and Stephenson said a deal among the tribes, the tracks and charities had come together in the last days, but it didn't pass before the May 20 deadline. The same session produced Laws 2024, ch. 119 (SF 2219), signed May 24, 2024. It banned historical horse racing machines at the tracks, which the Racing Commission had approved, and barred the commission from expanding gambling by rule.
Sen. Jeremy Miller filed a new version of his Minnesota Sports Betting Act in January 2025, with a 20% tax and 20% of the money going to horse racing. Klein filed SF 757 with a 22% tax. Klein's bill failed in its first committee in February 2025, and in May the Senate Taxes Committee rejected a proposal to study legalization. In 2026, Sen. Nick Frentz, Miller and two other senators introduced SF 4139 on March 4, with a 22% tax and a $250,000 license fee. Rasmusson moved to send it to the State and Local Government Committee, the Rules Committee refused, and the Senate record for March 23 shows a 22 to 44 vote on the committee report. The bill stayed in Commerce and Consumer Protection and saw no further action that session.
The 2026 prediction market ban
SF 4760, an omnibus public safety bill, carried the first version of the ban in Article 8. The Senate repassed it 57 to 9 and the House 100 to 32 on May 12, and Walz signed it May 18 as Laws 2026, ch. 97. SF 3432 (Laws 2026, ch. 118) passed 59 to 8 and 100 to 34 on May 16 and was signed May 26. It repealed that article and enacted a narrower version of new section 609.7615.
The final text makes it a felony, for consideration and as part of a business, to create or operate a prediction market, to list events or hold funds for one, or to supply it with outcome data, geolocation or payment processing. Advertising such products is also a felony. The definition covers contracts on sports and games, elections, legal actions, deaths, popular culture and whether a person will make a statement. The May 26 version turned the open-ended list in chapter 97 into a closed one and dropped short-term weather. It also limited contracts on government decisions to those whose main characteristic is not financial, commercial or economic. Insurance contracts under chapters 59A to 79A, and transactions that aren't bets under the existing definition in section 609.75, are exempt. The law took effect August 1, 2026, and the director of the Alcohol and Gambling Enforcement Division can issue cease-and-desist orders under it.
Sports betting court cases in Minnesota
Lower Sioux Indian Community v. Minnesota (D. Minn., 1990)
After the video compacts were signed, the Lower Sioux Indian Community sued to force the state to negotiate a blackjack compact, arguing that the state's exemption for private social bets meant Minnesota allowed blackjack. On December 20, 1990, a federal magistrate judge recommended ruling for the tribe. The attorney general's office warned that the reasoning would let "virtually any type of casino gambling, including sports betting" onto tribal land. The state settled and signed blackjack compacts with all 11 tribes, which waived further compact claims based on the social-bet exemption.
Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux Community and the Running Aces card club (Minn. Supreme Court No. A23-1738)
In 2023 the Racing Commission let Running Aces add one dealer table and 11 player stations of electronic table games to its card club. The Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux Community challenged the decision, and on September 23, 2024 the Minnesota Court of Appeals held that the tribe had standing but upheld the commission. On January 21, 2026, the Minnesota Supreme Court affirmed. It held that a tribe with a compact has standing to challenge an alleged expansion of gambling at a racetrack, but the justices were evenly divided on the merits (Justice Gaïtas took no part), so the approval stands with no ruling on whether the games are legal.
North Metro Harness Initiative v. Beattie (D. Minn. No. 0:24-cv-01369)
Running Aces, whose legal name is North Metro Harness Initiative, filed a federal racketeering suit on April 16, 2024 against officials of casinos run by the Prairie Island Indian Community, the Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe and the Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux Community. It alleged they offered card games their compacts don't allow, such as Three Card Poker and Ultimate Texas Hold'em. Chief Judge Patrick Schiltz dismissed the case without prejudice on March 11, 2025 for failure to join the tribes as required parties, and he denied Running Aces' motion to alter the judgment on August 15, 2025. The docket shows no appeal after that order.
The prediction market ban cases (D. Minn. Nos. 0:26-cv-02661, 0:26-cv-02778 and 0:26-cv-02841)
The United States and the CFTC sued the State of Minnesota on May 19, 2026, the day after the first version was signed. KalshiEX LLC sued Attorney General Keith Ellison, Walz and Alcohol and Gambling Enforcement Director Jon Anglin on May 27, and QCX LLC, which does business as Polymarket US, sued Ellison and other officials on June 3. Judge Katherine Menendez took all three cases. On June 29 she accepted an amicus brief from tribes and tribal groups including MIGA and the Fond du Lac Band, and she heard the injunction motions together on July 2.
On July 27, 2026, she granted all three motions. Until a final decision on the merits, the state can't enforce section 609.7615 against entities registered with the CFTC as designated contract markets. She found the plaintiffs likely to succeed on express preemption because many listed contracts, such as those on elections, appear to be swaps within the CFTC's exclusive jurisdiction. She also wrote that some contracts the statute reaches aren't swaps, and that a sports contract with no financial, economic or commercial consequence might not be one. She didn't decide the implied preemption or First Amendment claims. The state answered Kalshi's complaint on August 17, and an August 18 order set a pretrial conference for October 13, 2026. A late-September entry reset a hearing or deadline, and we couldn't confirm which one or whether the October 13 conference went ahead. We found no notice of appeal on the three dockets, but we couldn't check them after late September.
The Eighth Circuit and the Supreme Court
The Eighth Circuit, which covers Minnesota, hasn't ruled on prediction markets, and district courts inside it have split. In Iowa, Judge Stephen Locher denied Kalshi an injunction on September 8, 2026 (KalshiEX LLC v. Bird, No. 4:26-cv-00109), and Kalshi's appeal is Eighth Circuit No. 26-2874. Elsewhere, the Third Circuit sided with Kalshi against New Jersey on April 6, 2026 (No. 25-1922), and New Jersey's petition to the Supreme Court, No. 26-299, has a response due November 9, 2026. On September 25, 2026, the Sixth Circuit held in KalshiEX v. Schuler (Nos. 26-3196 and 26-5235) that Kalshi's sports contracts aren't swaps and, in the alternative, that the Commodity Exchange Act doesn't preempt state gambling law. That ruling doesn't bind Minnesota courts.
Prediction markets and daily fantasy
Under the July 27 injunction, the state can't enforce the ban against Kalshi, Polymarket US or any other designated contract market while the cases proceed. That class includes Novig (Ludlow Exchange, LLC), a CFTC-regulated prediction market designated June 16, 2026, whose eligibility page excludes only Nevada, Arizona and Michigan.
Daily fantasy has no statute of its own. Stephenson called it a gray market in 2024 when he tried to add fantasy and pick'em regulation to HF 2000, which failed with the rest of the bill. Fantasy apps that take Minnesota players generally require them to be 18 or older.
Help with a gambling problem
Minnesota's problem gambling helpline, funded by the Department of Human Services, is 1-800-333-HOPE (4673). It's toll-free, confidential and open 24 hours, and you can also text HOPE to 53342.
Sources
Minnesota Constitution (Article X, sec. 8 and Article XIII, sec. 5)
Minnesota Legislative Reference Library, gambling issue guide
House Research, Gambling in Minnesota: A Short History (2005)
Minnesota Department of Public Safety, tribal-state gaming compacts
Legal Sports Report on SF 1894 and tribal opposition (March 2020)
Minnesota Laws 2024, chapter 119 (historical horse racing ban)
Legal Sports Report on the Running Aces suit and historical horse racing (April 2024)
Legal Sports Report on the SF 4139 referral fight (March 2026)
Minnesota Laws 2026, chapter 118 (final prediction market statute)
CFTC press release on its suit against Minnesota (May 19, 2026)
Minnesota Attorney General release on the state's opposition brief (June 18, 2026)
United States v. State of Minnesota, No. 0:26-cv-02661, docket (CourtListener)
KalshiEX LLC v. Ellison, No. 0:26-cv-02778, docket (CourtListener)
QCX LLC v. Ellison, No. 0:26-cv-02841, docket (CourtListener)
Order granting preliminary injunctions, July 27, 2026 (Menendez, J.)
North Metro Harness Initiative LLC v. Beattie, No. 0:24-cv-01369, docket (CourtListener)
Tribal Business News on the August 2025 denial of Running Aces' motion
KalshiEX LLC v. Bird, No. 4:26-cv-00109, S.D. Iowa docket (CourtListener)
KalshiEX LLC v. Schuler, 6th Cir. Nos. 26-3196 and 26-5235 (September 25, 2026)
Legal Sports Report on fantasy sports in HF 2000 (March 2024)
Minnesota problem gambling helpline (Department of Human Services program)