Lawmakers in Illinois introduced a new bill on March 5, 2026, which aims to regulate prediction markets through a new framework supervised by the Illinois Gaming Board.
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New bill to ban federal officials from using event contracts
Two U.S. senators, Jeff Merkley and Amy Klobuchar, introduced a new bill on March 5, 2026, called the End Prediction Market Corruption Act, to fight against federal officials using non-public information for trading on prediction markets.
Chris Van Hollen, Adam Schiff, and Kirsten Gillibrand are the co-sponsors of the bill, as it proposes to ban the president, vice president, and members of Congress from buying or selling event contracts on prediction markets.
If the measure is passed, elected officials would be fully prohibited from using event contracts, while senior executive branch officials would face restrictions on contracts that are connected to their official duties and could face fines of up to $10,000 in case of violations. A “senior executive branch official” is defined as a non-elected government employee who files financial disclosure reports about income, assets, liabilities, and financial transactions.
Merkley stated:
“When public officials use non-public information to win a bet, you have the perfect recipe to undermine the public’s belief that government officials are working for the public good, not for their own personal profits. Perfectly timed bets on prediction markets have the unmistakable stench of corruption. To protect the public interest, Congress must step up and pass my End Prediction Market Corruption Act to crack down on this bad bet for democracy.”
Disclosure requirements are also included in the proposed bill, which means that elected officials and senior executive branch personnel would have to include in their annual financial disclosure filings if they, their spouses, or their children have bought or sold event contracts and, if so, add a description of the contract and its value.
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