Former US Rep. George Santos Banned From Kalshi for Life After Betting on Himself

Prediction-market trade Kalshi has completely banned former US Rep. George Santos from accessing the platform after its Compliance Department discovered “cheap trigger to consider” that he engaged in insider buying and selling and market manipulation.

The lifetime ban, efficient August 28, 2026, is the primary everlasting penalty of its variety imposed by Kalshi on a person.

Penalty and Lifetime Ban

According to the official compliance doc, Santos traded in markets linked as to if he would attend the State of the Union deal with on February 24, regardless of being prohibited from buying and selling in these markets as a result of he was able to influencing the result of the underlying occasion. Kalshi stated Santos positioned a sequence of huge trades between February 2 and February 25 in contracts whose outcomes depended on his personal attendance.

The platform stated Santos materially benefited from the exercise and earned $17,839.57 from the focused markets. Alongside the everlasting suspension of direct and oblique entry to the trade, the Compliance Department has additionally imposed a $71,356 penalty.

In response to the event, Santos took to X to assault Kalshi and accused the latter of violating its personal notices and deadlines. He stated that the August 7 discover allegedly gave his aspect 30 days earlier than the newest motion, as he questioned why the trade had introduced “frivolous nonsense” earlier than that interval was over.

“Leaking and a focus searching for appear to be the M/O of this group. Pathetic!”

The motion comes after a settlement Santos reached final month with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, which has stated it has jurisdiction over prediction markets. He agreed to pay $35,000 underneath the settlement however didn’t admit or deny the company’s findings. His counsel, Joseph W. Murray, stated Santos cooperated with the CFTC.

The former congressman was expelled from the House of Representatives in 2023 after dealing with federal fees. In April 2025, he was sentenced to greater than seven years in jail after pleading responsible to wire fraud and id theft. In October of that yr, Trump introduced that he had commuted the sentence, and Santos was launched after serving lower than three months.

Kalshi had beforehand suspended three US political candidates after discovering they wager on election outcomes they have been straight concerned in, whereas calling the exercise “political insider buying and selling.”

More Heat on Prediction Markets

Prediction-market platforms face rising scrutiny from regulators and lawmakers. Last month, Baltimore officers sued Kalshi and Polymarket, alleging that their sports activities prediction contracts quantity to unlicensed sports activities betting and may mislead customers about their authorized and regulatory standing.

Meanwhile, Kalshi can also be combating a lawsuit from New York Attorney General Letitia James. The trade has individually confronted a lawsuit from FlightAware over flight-related markets, though that case was withdrawn shortly after being filed.

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