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Sam Marshall sues Kalshi and its CEO over tribal PokkeTrades app before launch

The tribal-court petition says the Alabama-Quassarte Tribal Town never approved the Kalshi-powered app due in November. No ruling was reported, and the app's site still says coming soon.

October 30, 2026 · Effective · Verified 2026-11-07 via official docs

The Alabama-Quassarte Tribal Town and Sam Marshall, who says he is its chief, filed suit on 30 October 2026 in the District Court of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation against Kalshi Inc., KalshiEX, Kalshi Klear, CEO Tarek Mansour and others. The case, CV-2026-0173, disputes Kalshi's 7 October announcement that the Town would launch PokkeTrades, a prediction market app powered by Kalshi. Mvskoke Media reported the filing on 6 November.

The petition alleges that the Town removed Wilson Yargee as chief in 2021 and never approved the app, and that Kalshi and the other defendants were wrong to name him as chief and say the Town owns it. These are allegations and no court has ruled on them. Kalshi's announcement quotes Yargee as chief. Federal records list both Marshall and Yargee as chiefs and note a leadership dispute, Front Office Sports reports. Kalshi told that outlet on 16 October, before the suit, that an agreement was approved and that a signed agreement exists. We found no Kalshi response to the suit.

Plaintiffs ask for a temporary restraining order and a fast hearing. Mvskoke Media says they seek to prevent PokkeTrades from launching, but the order they propose is narrower: it would bar the defendants from advertising that the Town owns, sponsors or has approved the app, from claiming authority to act for the Town, and from accessing Town funds. The petition says the defendants could still do business without that claim. It also asks the court to declare that no PokkeTrades agreement binds the Town, and seeks damages, punitive damages and corrected announcements, with claims including fraud, defamation and conspiracy.

Earlier cases over the Town's leadership ended on jurisdiction. Mvskoke Media says an earlier Town suit in the same court was dismissed in 2022 for lack of jurisdiction, and Front Office Sports says a federal judge dismissed a 2022 suit by Marshall's side in 2023 as an internal tribal dispute. The petition relies on a December 2025 Okmulgee County order that it says upheld Yargee's removal. The suit concerns this one app, and the relief it lists does not ask to stop trading on Kalshi itself. The PokkeTrades site showed a coming-soon page with an early access list on 7 November. Three other tribal apps named in the same announcement are not part of the case.

“Plaintiffs ask the Court to stop Defendants from trading on the Town's name and authority before the app's announced November 2026 launch, and to remedy the harm done.”

— Verified petition, CV-2026-0173

Who this affects

People waiting for the PokkeTrades app. Trading on Kalshi itself is not a target of the requested order.

Kalshi at a glance

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