Prediction market platform Kalshi has appointed Stephanie Cutter, a former staffer to U.S. President Barack Obama, as a policy adviser. The announcement, made on Thursday, comes as the company seeks to deepen its relationships in Washington D.C. and across the country amid increasing regulatory and legal challenges.
Cutter joins from Precision Strategies, the communications firm she co-founded in 2013. Kalshi co-founder and CEO Tarek Mansour highlighted her political and government background, stating her experience will help the company "get [the] message to the right people." This move is part of a broader, bipartisan strategy to navigate a complex regulatory landscape. In January 2025, the company appointed Donald Trump Jr. as a strategic adviser.
The appointment occurs against a backdrop of significant legal pressure. Over the past year, Kalshi has faced lawsuits from multiple U.S. state authorities. These lawsuits allege that event contracts, particularly those tied to sports outcomes, constitute illegal gambling under state law. At the federal level, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), under Trump nominee Michael Selig, has asserted "exclusive jurisdiction" over such markets and has filed lawsuits against state gaming regulators to establish its authority.
Congress has also increased its scrutiny. Some Democratic lawmakers have called for investigations into "suspicious trades" related to geopolitical events, specifically mentioning activity around the U.S. invasion of Iran. In response, Kalshi and competitor Polymarket announced plans in March to implement guardrails to prevent the use of insider information. Despite this, lawmakers have proposed legislation that could ban politicians from participating in prediction markets. As of now, none of these bills have been signed into law, and the outcomes of the various state-level lawsuits remain unclear.
