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Derek Brown is a Republican lawyer and politician who has been Utah's attorney general since January 2025. He represented House District 49, covering Sandy and Cottonwood Heights, in the Utah House of Representatives from 2011 to 2014, and then served as deputy chief of staff and state director for U.S. Senator Mike Lee. He earlier practiced constitutional and appellate law at Mayer Brown and Sidley Austin, worked as legal counsel to Senators Bob Bennett and Orrin Hatch, and later chaired the Utah Republican Party.
Role at the time: Utah Attorney General, in a statement to FOX 13 News
Condemned
Statement summary
Utah Attorney General Derek Brown says gambling is illegal in Utah whether a person places the bet, runs the game or promotes it, that neither the prediction market label nor federal registration changes that, and that Kalshi kept taking bets from Utahns after a federal court ruled that the state's gambling laws apply to it.
“Gambling is illegal in Utah, whether you place the bet, run the game, or promote it. Calling it a ‘prediction market’ doesn’t change what it is, and being federally registered doesn’t put a company above the law. A federal court has already ruled that Utah’s gambling laws apply to Kalshi. Kalshi kept taking bets from Utahns anyway. That is illegal, and we’re putting a stop to it”
Relative to Kalshi's offering of sports event contracts to Utah users, Brown calls the offering illegal gambling and says the state is putting a stop to it.
Utah's attorney general charged Kalshi and co-founders Tarek Mansour and Luana Lopes Lara with felony gambling promotion over sports wagers placed from Utah. Kalshi calls the case political overreach, and the CFTC says federal law overrides Utah's gambling laws for its exchanges.
