Spencer Cox

University of Utah economics professor Scott Schaefer says the difference lies in how predication markets and traditional gambling are regulated. The question over regulation is what state and federal lawmakers are grappling with.

The announcement won praise from Western Republican lawmakers while drawing criticism from environmental groups that see the move as an attempt to dismantle the agency. Federal officials say the change puts leaders closer to the forests they manage.

When it comes to prediction markets, if it “walks like a duck and quacks like a duck,” Gov. Spencer Cox said. “It's a duck” — meaning the apps are gambling, and should be banned in Utah.

The governor is scheduled to meet the press at 10:00 a.m. MDT on Thursday, March 19, 2025.

Utah is at the forefront of a states' rights battle with prediction markets like Kalshi and Polymarket. It's over the definition of gambling and whether states can keep these smartphone apps out.

The session is done. 540 bills were passed out of 1,020 pitched. But instead of ending on a bang, as it had in the past, the session ended with a polite "here, here" and a golf clap.

After a weeks-long spat with Idaho, Utah leaders tout deals to increase gas supply and cut the gas tax at home, while they also inked an interstate collaboration on the Bear River watershed.

This ruling comes days after the Utah Supreme Court dismissed a separate request to let the state keep using its 2021 congressional map.

A memo from the White House said a child safety AI bill from state Republican Rep. Doug Fiefia was “an unfixable bill that goes against the Administration’s AI agenda.”

The past Olympic week in Italy saw opinions on U.S. international diplomacy and domestic politics mixed liberally into the sports. Cox says "we care deeply about the political situation that is happening in the United States right now.”

It’s been four years since Utah's “Year of Water” at the Legislature, and now the state has its worst snowpack on record. We check in on what lawmakers have done since and what it means for Great Salt Lake.

State negotiators entered the meeting at a years-long impasse over how water restrictions should be managed during dry years. They now have less than two weeks until a federal Feb. 14 deadline.