Utah Representative introduces bill to define and ban prop bets

Efforts to strengthen gambling restrictions in Utah have advanced with new legislation aiming to outlaw proposition betting, a form of sports wagering that has drawn increasing attention across multiple U.S. states.

House Bill 243, introduced last week by Representative Joseph Elison, seeks to formally define proposition bets as illegal gambling under Section 76-9-1401 of the Utah Criminal Code. The bill proposes to expand the statutory language by adding prop bets to the list of gambling-related definitions, which already includes categories such as lotteries, sweepstakes, and skill-based games.

The legislation defines a proposition wager as one placed on an individual action, statistic, occurrence, or non-occurrence during an athletic event. Elison stated to SBC Americas that this move is intended to eliminate ambiguity about whether such wagers fall within the state’s existing gambling prohibitions.

Although Utah’s state constitution already bans all forms of gambling, Elison has expressed concern about digital platforms potentially offering betting access to Utahns. In an interview with ABC4, he noted reports that some operators may be operating in violation of state law.

Should the bill be enacted, Elison said the Attorney General’s office would have grounds to issue cease-and-desist letters to non-compliant companies.

At the same time, Elison stated that the bill would not apply to fantasy sports or federally regulated prediction markets. “This bill does not touch the Prediction Markets platforms, which fall under the federal Commodity Futures Trading Commission and which we are not allowed to regulate on a state level,” he said. “It also does not touch the fantasy leagues, which many states throughout the country have deemed as ‘games of skill’.”

Prediction markets remain accessible to Utah residents via platforms such as Kalshi, which allow users to speculate on event outcomes that may closely resemble player proposition bets. Last September, Utah Representative John Curtis co-authored a letter with five other lawmakers urging the Commodity Futures Trading Commission not to approve the expansion of such platforms into sports wagering.

Utah’s move comes in the middle of reexamination of prop betting in other jurisdictions. In New Jersey, Assembly Bill 5971, introduced in November, would prohibit in-game proposition bets, referred to in the text as micro-betting. The legislation was prompted by concerns over integrity risks in professional and college sports, and its Senate counterpart remains under committee consideration.

Another New Jersey proposal, Senate Bill 1170, would ban wagers on individual college athlete performances. The bill, introduced with bipartisan support, aligns with renewed NCAA advocacy for a nationwide prohibition on college-specific prop bets. Meanwhile, the Missouri Gaming Commission recently opted not to restrict college player props, less than two months after launching legal sports betting.