Senate cloture vote on CLARITY Act fails, stalling prediction market rules
The U.S. Senate failed to advance the CLARITY Act on a 49-50 cloture vote Tuesday, September 15, stalling legislation that would have established federal rules for prediction markets and event contracts. Senator Cortez Masto raised concerns over illegal gambling operations. The vote leaves regulatory uncertainty unresolved as Crypto.com and Robinhood pursue Supreme Court petitions on related matters. The legal fight over sports-event contracts now sits with the courts.
The cloture failure kills the clearest legislative path to uniform federal rules, leaving prediction market operators to fight state by state. Kalshi, Polymarket, and Crypto.com now face continued legal fragmentation without the CLARITY Act's preemption shield. Tribal lobbying had already turned the bill into a federalism battle, and this stall leaves those geographic carve-outs unresolved. Operators must keep modeling revenue around partial market access rather than a single national regime.
The Supreme Court petitions from Crypto.com and Robinhood become the industry's best remaining shot at a unified answer. Each new state suit — Connecticut's order to nine platforms, Baltimore's action — compounds faster than courts can resolve them. Platforms that budgeted for legislative clarity this term must now extend legal reserves for open-ended litigation. Traders face geofenced markets and inconsistent contract availability while the federal gridlock persists.
Three platforms have now petitioned the Supreme Court to resolve circuit splits on prediction-market preemption, as Crypto.com and Robinhood press the justices alongside earlier filers for a federal answer to state gambling enforcement.