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{"id":24759,"date":"2026-06-24T17:17:18","date_gmt":"2026-06-24T17:17:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/house-panel-advances-bill-banning-lawmakers-from-political-betting-markets\/"},"modified":"2026-06-24T17:17:18","modified_gmt":"2026-06-24T17:17:18","slug":"house-panel-advances-bill-banning-lawmakers-from-political-betting-markets","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/house-panel-advances-bill-banning-lawmakers-from-political-betting-markets\/","title":{"rendered":"House panel advances bill banning lawmakers from political betting markets"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<p>House Republicans have advanced a <a href=\"https:\/\/legislation.politicopro.com\/bill\/US_119_HR_9367\" target=\"_blank\">bill<\/a> that would prohibit members of Congress and their family members from trading on certain Washington-focused prediction markets. <\/p>\n<p>The House Administration Committee&#8217;s GOP members on Wednesday voted along party lines <a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/live-updates\/2026\/06\/18\/congress\/steil-bill-lawmakers-ban-prediction-markets-00967679\" target=\"_blank\">in favor of the legislation<\/a>, which proposes to bar lawmakers, their spouses and their dependent children from participating on prediction markets that are based on the outcome of elections or government actions. <\/p>\n<p>It marks the latest in Capitol Hill&#8217;s efforts to curb the threat of insider trading on the prediction markets \u2014 a risk that has <a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/news\/2026\/04\/24\/washington-plans-prediction-markets-00891712\" target=\"_blank\">burst into the spotlight<\/a> in recent months after a series of well-timed trades around the capture of then-Venezuelan leader Nicol\u00e1s Maduro, <a href=\"https:\/\/subscriber.politicopro.com\/article\/2026\/05\/google-engineer-charged-over-insider-trading-scheme-on-polymarket-00939460\" target=\"_blank\">Google&#8217;s search results<\/a> and the Iran war. Earlier this year, the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/live-updates\/2026\/04\/30\/congress\/new-ban-on-prediction-market-trading-00901232\" target=\"_blank\">Senate banned<\/a> its members and their staffs from trading on the prediction markets altogether, effective immediately. <\/p>\n<p>And yet, the House Administration Committee vote also revealed a fracture within the House over how far to go in clamping down on lawmakers&#8217; use of the prediction markets. Democrats opposed the bill, saying it didn&#8217;t go far enough, while Republicans supported it.<\/p>\n<p>Rep. <a href=\"https:\/\/directory.politicopro.com\/member\/196354\" data-person-id=\"196354\">Joe Morelle<\/a> of New York, who is the committee&#8217;s top Democrat, argued that the legislation is &#8220;so filled with loopholes that it looks more like a sieve than a bill.&#8221; Instead of passing such a bill, he said the House should follow the Senate&#8217;s lead and approve a new and broader resolution aimed at prediction market use among members and their staffs. <\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The Senate did it in a matter of minutes \u2014 no six-month grace period, no procedurally laborious process,&#8221; Morelle said. &#8220;They just went to the floor with a two-page resolution and banned it all unanimously. We should do the same.&#8221; <\/p>\n<p>House Administration Chair <a href=\"https:\/\/directory.politicopro.com\/member\/32319\" data-person-id=\"32319\">Bryan Steil<\/a>, who introduced the bill, hit back at his Democratic counterpart&#8217;s concerns by questioning why members&#8217; families shouldn&#8217;t be allowed to bet on sports through the prediction markets \u2014 but can through sportsbooks or casinos. <\/p>\n<p>The Wisconsin Republican pointed to a hypothetical scenario where a member&#8217;s child is at college and bets on a sporting event through a prediction market platform. That situation, he said, could be covered by a broader prohibition.<\/p>\n<p>Steil, rather, said his bill is aimed at addressing public policy- and election-focused markets. <\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Lawmakers elect to serve the American people, not to enrich themselves by wagering on outcomes from the decisions they make,&#8221; he said. &#8220;We have a real opportunity to restore trust in Congress by taking necessary steps to eliminate even the appearance of impropriety.&#8221;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>House Republicans have advanced a bill that would prohibit members of Congress and their family members from trading on certain Washington-focused prediction markets. The House Administration Committee&#8217;s GOP members on Wednesday voted along party lines in favor of the legislation, which proposes to bar lawmakers, their spouses and their dependent children from participating on prediction [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-24759","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-congress"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24759","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=24759"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24759\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24759"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24759"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24759"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}