George Santos, the disgraced former U.S. representative, is firing back at Kalshi after the prediction market slapped him with its first-ever lifetime ban.
Kalshi accused Santos of improperly manipulating the price of contracts on the platform, pointing to his public statements about planning to attend the State of the Union address earlier this year, and wagers he subsequently made on that contract. (Heled people to believe he would be at the speech, but was not. He bet against his attendance).
Santos, via trades on the platform about that event, made profits of $17,840, the companysaid in a regulatory filing. That resulted in the permanent suspension.
In a social media post, Santos sniped at the prediction market,writing “Hey @Kalshi thanks for the lifetime ban from your gambling platform. Let’s see how much longer you guys are around for.”
Moneywise has reached out to Santos’s team for comment. In a follow-up post, he wrote “@Kalshi is such an unserious company it violates its own notices and deadlines lol. On August 7th they gave us a 30 day notice and today they leaked/ announced once again their frivolous nonsense. Leaking and attention seeking seem to be the M/O of this organization.”
Penalties: Round 2
Kalshi’s ban isn’t the first trouble Santos has gotten into over his bets on the prediction market. In July, the Commodity Futures Trading Commissionfined him $35,000 for deceiving bettors. Santos agreed to return the profits from his wager as well as pay a civil penalty.
The problems at Kalshi, meanwhile, are far from Santos’ first dip in legal hot water. In 2023, he was charged with fraud by federal prosecutors and expelled from his House seat. Subsequent investigations uncovered he had lied extensively in his biography, and he became a punchline on programs such as Saturday Night Live.
In 2025, he wassentenced to seven years and three months in prison. He served less than three months before his sentence wascommuted by President Donald Trump. He currentlydescribes himself as “fashion police” and an “entertainer & TV personality” on the social media platform X.
Santos wasn’t the only person to be penalized by Kalshi. Three Republican political candidates — Ben Midgley, Stephen Cloobeck, and Laurie Buckhout — were also suspended from the platform (though not for life) for betting on contracts related to their own races. Kalshi said all three cooperated with its investigation.
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Prediction market pains
Prediction markets have been under fire for some time by regulators over how easy it is to manipulate them. That has been especially concerning when people with access to government information make bets.
In April, the Justice Departmentannounced a U.S. soldier named Gannon Ken Van Dyke had been arrested and charged for placing bets on a similar platform, Polymarket, using classified information he had access to regarding the capture of former Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro.
Van Dyke allegedly bet just over $33,000 on the markets before the military action, winning nearly $410,000, officials say. He’s charged with three counts of violating the Commodity Exchange Act, each of which carries a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison; one count of wire fraud, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison; and one count of an unlawful monetary transaction, which carries a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison.
And earlier this week, Gabriel Perez, a White House teleprompter operator, wasordered to pay $172,000 for making online prediction trades on Kalshi that were based on information from upcoming speeches. Perez was also given a three-year trading ban by Kalshi.
Chris Morris is a veteran journalist with more than 35 years of experience at many of the internet's biggest news outlets. In addition to his activities as a writer, reporter and editor, Chris is also a frequent panel moderator and speaker at major conferences, including CES and South by Southwest.
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