{"id":23629,"date":"2026-06-04T09:22:19","date_gmt":"2026-06-04T09:22:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/ap-source-says-george-santos-reported-to-prosecutors-over-suspicious-kalshi-trades\/"},"modified":"2026-06-04T09:22:19","modified_gmt":"2026-06-04T09:22:19","slug":"ap-source-says-george-santos-reported-to-prosecutors-over-suspicious-kalshi-trades","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/ap-source-says-george-santos-reported-to-prosecutors-over-suspicious-kalshi-trades\/","title":{"rendered":"AP source says George Santos reported to prosecutors over suspicious Kalshi trades"},"content":{"rendered":"<div xmlns:xlink=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/1999\/xlink\">\n<div>\n<div><a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/author\/jake-offenhartz\">             <picture data-crop=\"60x60\"><source type=\"image\/webp\" width=\"60\" height=\"60\"><source width=\"60\" height=\"60\"><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"60\" height=\"60\" src=\"https:\/\/dims.apnews.com\/dims4\/default\/e19f4eb\/2147483647\/strip\/true\/crop\/3840x3840+983+0\/resize\/60x60!\/quality\/90\/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fassets.apnews.com%2Fe2%2F3f%2F6bd96dea4a78bf2b3af77b310f0c%2Fjake-offenhartz-jake-offenhartz.jpg\" loading=\"lazy\"><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/a><\/div>\n<div>\n<p>                                <bsp-timestamp data-timestamp=\"1780493707000\" data-recent-thresholdinhours=\"1\">                    <template data-date-tpl>Updated [hour]:[minute] [AMPM] [timezone], [monthFull] [day], [year]<\/template>                    <span data-date><\/span>                <\/bsp-timestamp>            <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>                                    <bsp-page-actions>                            <\/bsp-page-actions>                                                            <\/div>\n<div>\n<p>NEW YORK (AP) &mdash; A prediction market reported former U.S. Rep. <span><a data-gtm-enhancement-style=\"LinkEnhancementA\" href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/george-santos\">George Santos<\/a><\/span>  to federal prosecutors after he boasted he&rsquo;d be going to President Donald Trump&rsquo;s State of the Union address, then bet against his own attendance, according to a person familiar with the investigation.<\/p>\n<p><span><a data-gtm-enhancement-style=\"LinkEnhancementA\" href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/sports-betting-prediction-markets-memes-gamification-59e79f3f85800e1301fa71f235cf0cf8\">Kalshi<\/a><\/span>the online prediction marketplace, referred Santos to the Department of Justice after detecting suspicious trades made by him ahead of Trump&rsquo;s Feb. 24 speech, the person said. The person spoke to The Associated Press on the condition of anonymity because they weren&rsquo;t authorized to discuss the matter publicly.<\/p>\n<p>Kalshi also reported the trades to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, a federal regulatory body that has vowed to crack down on insider trading in prediction marketplaces.<\/p>\n<p>The Justice Department and the CFTC didn&rsquo;t immediately respond Tuesday to inquiries from the AP.<\/p>\n<p>Santos also did not respond to text messages or phone calls.<\/p>\n<p>The referral was <span><a data-gtm-enhancement-style=\"LinkEnhancementA\" href=\"https:\/\/www.npr.org\/2026\/06\/02\/nx-s1-5843371\/george-santos-kalshi-insider-trading-investigation\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">first reported by NPR<\/a><\/span>. Santos told NPR that he wasn&rsquo;t aware of the investigation. He declined to say whether he had a Kalshi account.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;I&rsquo;m not saying yes, I&rsquo;m not saying no,&rdquo; Santos told NPR.<\/p>\n<p>The <span><a data-gtm-enhancement-style=\"LinkEnhancementA\" href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/george-santos-plea-court-new-york-90741d068fd94090419fc0fd79be30cc\">convicted ex-congressman<\/a><\/span>  had repeatedly discussed his intention to attend the State of the Union, which came just four months after he was granted clemency by Trump in a fraud case that led to his expulsion from the U.S. House.<\/p>\n<p>On the eve of Trump&rsquo;s speech, Kalshi put the odds of Santos attending at close to 75%.<\/p>\n<p>Then, minutes into the speech, Santos <span><a data-gtm-enhancement-style=\"LinkEnhancementA\" href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/Georgesantos\/status\/2026433381911638407\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">posted on X<\/a><\/span>  that he had been waylaid at the airport. Immediately, several social media users accused him of running another scheme.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;Santos talking to his accountant and telling him to open his Kalshi account and bet all his money on No,&rdquo; one user <span><a data-gtm-enhancement-style=\"LinkEnhancementA\" href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/TomMcGuire_12\/status\/2026446169077952790?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">wrote<\/a><\/span>alongside a meme of Al Pacino counting money in the movie Scarface.<\/p>\n<p>In March, Santos <span><a data-gtm-enhancement-style=\"LinkEnhancementA\" href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=UEXywcshKp8\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">addressed<\/a><\/span>  the complaints on his podcast.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;I guess people lost money,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Some people made unexpected money. That&rsquo;s to show you how fragile these markets are.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Santos, who won office as a Republican after inventing a bogus persona as a Wall Street dealmaker, was sentenced to seven years in prison after <span><a data-gtm-enhancement-style=\"LinkEnhancementA\" href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/george-santos-plea-court-new-york-90741d068fd94090419fc0fd79be30cc\">pleading guilty to fraud<\/a><\/span>  and identity theft in 2024.<\/p>\n<p>After serving just 84 days, he was ordered released by Trump, who called Santos a &ldquo;rogue&rdquo; but said he didn&rsquo;t deserve a harsh sentence and should get credit for voting Republican.<\/p>\n<p>Prediction markets, including Kalshi and its chief rival Polymarket, have <span><a data-gtm-enhancement-style=\"LinkEnhancementA\" href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/polymarket-kalshi-trump-iran-prediction-congress-d16d7bdf9a56cc1466b44baaf634aeeb\">drawn scrutiny<\/a><\/span>  as their businesses have expanded &mdash; with some lawmakers urging the platforms to do more to guard against insider trading.<\/p>\n<p>Both companies have said they are reporting suspicious trades to federal regulators. Some investigations have led to criminal charges. In April a soldier involved in the military operation to capture Venezuelan President Nicol&aacute;s Maduro <span><a data-gtm-enhancement-style=\"LinkEnhancementA\" href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/solider-justice-department-polymarmet-74047663d9ae104127948896fdfb59d9\">was charged with using classified information<\/a><\/span>  to win more than $400,000 predicting the date of his capture on Polymarket.<\/p>\n<p>In April, the Senate approved a bipartisan resolution to prevent its own members from using <span><a data-gtm-enhancement-style=\"LinkEnhancementA\" href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/kalshi-polymarket-iran-congress-scrutiny-legislation-trading-3a29fdaf0b42ec6c670a4eaffaf67cc0\">prediction markets<\/a><\/span>.<\/p>\n<p>___<\/p>\n<p>The story has been updated to correct in the first sentence that Santos is a former congressman, not a current one.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/george-santos-kalshi-2ea925949a0f3f72ec46411b41344858\" class=\"button purchase\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Updated [hour]:[minute] [AMPM] [timezone], [monthFull] [day], [year] NEW YORK (AP) &mdash; A prediction market reported former U.S. Rep. George Santos to federal prosecutors after he boasted he&rsquo;d be going to President Donald Trump&rsquo;s State of the Union address, then bet against his own attendance, according to a person familiar with the investigation. Kalshithe online prediction [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":23630,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23629","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-trump"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23629","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23629"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23629\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23630"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23629"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23629"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23629"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}