‘Stop Lawmakers From Predicting’: GOP Bill Targets Congress Betting on Kalshi and Polymarket

A new frontier between legislation and betting

Rep. Bryan Steil (R-Wis.), chairman of the House Administration Committee, revealed the measure recently, presenting it as a basic ethical safeguard. “It is inappropriate for members of Congress to negotiate over election results or public policy,” Steil said. The bill targets a rapidly growing market segment where users can bet real money on the achievement of a specific government policy, government action or political outcome.

Under the legislation, House members, their spouses and dependent children would be prohibited from placing such bets. Basically, the ban is narrow, covering betting on political events (including anything brought to a lawmaker’s attention in the course of his or her service in Congress) while allowing betting on unrelated events such as sports.

Violators face a penalty of at least $2,000 or 10% of the value of the trade, whichever is greater, and will have to forfeit any net profit from the bet. Lawmakers would also be barred from using their office or campaign funds to pay these penalties, closing an obvious loophole.

The proposal has notable political support, with House Speaker Mike Johnson and President Donald Trump both supporting the measure. The move mirrors an action taken by the Senate earlier this year, when it adopted a rule prohibit senators and their staff from betting on prediction markets.

A market under increasing surveillance

The bill appears as prediction markets continued to face pressure on several fronts. More recently, Bitcoin.com News reported that the House Oversight Committee, led by Rep. James Comer, launched an investigation in Polymarket and Kalshi on insider trading protections, with Comer calling the space the “Wild West” where “there are no rules.”

The platforms have also sparked challenges at the state level Kalshi sue Minnesota to block America’s first criminal ban on prediction marketsarguing that the contracts are federally regulated derivatives products subject to the exclusive oversight of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC).

In all this, the stakes seem high, given that the sector has seen explosive growth, with Polymarket and Kalshi entering a market together. $25.7 billion per month in April, transforming what was once a niche corner of crypto in a general public place to bet on the news.

Why Congress is concerned

The concern driving Steil’s bill is simple: Members of Congress routinely have nonpublic information about whether legislation will pass, how agencies will act, and when policy will change. A liquid market that pays exactly these outcomes creates an obvious temptation to trade (making it the political equivalent of insider trading in stocks, which is already illegal for lawmakers under separate rules).

By excluding sports and other unrelated events, the bill attempts to thread a needle, restricting the bets most prone to abuse without banning them. prediction markets downright. It will be interesting to see if this distinction persists in practice and how it would be applied to spouses/adult children.

For the future,The law to prevent lawmakers from predicting faces an arduous journey of first going through committee and then a floor vote, although support from the speaker and speaker gives it unusual initial momentum.