Drake has a real shot at walking away from a New Mexico gambling lawsuit, and it could happen while the rest of the case sits frozen.
A federal judge has paused most of the Stake litigation again but carved out space for the rapper and streamer Adin Ross to keep arguing they never should have been sued there.
Chief U.S. District Judge Kenneth J. Gonzales signed the partial-stay order on Friday, November 13. Both sides had asked for another 90-day pause while a separate case in Illinois works out if Stake-related claims have to go through arbitration instead of court.
The one door Gonzales left open covers the pending motions to dismiss for lack of personal jurisdiction.
Drake and Ross argue that online content available to everyone in the country doesn’t create the kind of New Mexico ties needed to haul them into court in that state.
This isn’t a new carve-out either. The judge first let those motions move forward back in August, and the paperwork has been rolling ever since.
Drake and Ross filed on September 7, the plaintiffs answered on September 21, and the defendants fired back with their reply on October 5.
Under that same August order, discovery and the expected arbitration fight stayed on ice. That means the jurisdiction question is the only part of this case with any real momentum right now.
The plaintiffs, Nathaniel Torres and Rory Michie, see it very differently. They claim Stake.us used deceptive promotion to pull them into gambling, and they’ve named Drake, Ross and the operator in claims that include violations of New Mexico’s Unfair Practices Act and unjust enrichment.
Torres and Michie have also pushed to dig into Drake’s Stake payments and how far his promotional reach actually went.
They want records showing if New Mexico residents engaged with the defendants’ content or used their referral links and promo codes, which would cut right to the heart of the jurisdiction fight.
For context, Drake’s ties to Stake have been very public, with the rapper streaming high-stakes bets and posting winning and losing slips to his followers.
Ross built a huge audience through livestreaming and has also been closely associated with the platform, which is part of why both names ended up in this complaint.
In a joint report filed Wednesday, lawyers on both sides pointed to an unresolved arbitration request in Urdan v. Sweepsteaks Limited as the reason to keep waiting.
That case is pending in the Northern District of Illinois. “There has not yet been a ruling on the pending motion to compel arbitration in Urdan,” the parties wrote, adding that the New Mexico case was still in its early stages even with jurisdiction briefing finished.
Gonzales wants the next update to tackle the bigger question head on. He ordered the parties to tell the court if the stay should be fully lifted, and when.
That next joint report is due February 11, 2027, or within 14 days of a ruling in Urdan, whichever lands first. In the meantime, Drake and Ross are waiting to hear if a New Mexico court can even touch them.
