A White House teleprompter operator accused of using nonpublic information about President Donald Trump’s speeches to place profitable bets on prediction market platform Kalshi no longer works for the federal government, a White House official confirmed Tuesday. The official declined to say whether Gabriel Perez resigned or was dismissed, making his departure the first confirmed employment consequence from the reported betting activity.
Perez had operated Trump’s teleprompter since 2016 and was placed on unpaid leave earlier this month after reports linked him to more than $100,000 in winnings. The trades allegedly involved contracts tied to specific words and phrases Trump might use during major addresses, including the State of the Union. His reported winnings exceeded half of the $175,000 annual salary listed for his White House role.
Kalshi’s head of enforcement, Robert Denault, said the company’s surveillance team flagged, investigated, and referred the relevant trades to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), though he did not name Perez. The platform’s policies prohibit customers from placing bets using information obtained through their employment. The trades occurred in Kalshi’s “Mentions” market, where participants wager on whether particular words or phrases will appear in public statements — a format that can be vulnerable to misuse by speechwriters, staff, and advisers with advance knowledge.
The case is part of a broader debate over whether prediction markets create fresh incentives for insider trading. In April, federal prosecutors indicted a U.S. soldier for betting on the potential removal of Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro, and Kalshi fined three political candidates who traded contracts linked to their own campaigns. Kalshi’s June 2026 monthly volume reached a record $9.4 billion, while an alternative methodology placed June notional volume at $31 billion. Pew estimated that Kalshi and crypto-based rival Polymarket generated about $24 billion in combined monthly volume in April 2026.
Regulatory pressure is mounting. Minnesota enacted a broad ban on prediction markets in May, but U.S. District Judge Katherine Menendez issued a preliminary injunction on July 28, finding federal law preempts the state prohibition. The Perez allegations may fuel calls for national rules on employee disclosures and trading based on confidential government information, potentially shaping the future oversight of both regulated and decentralized prediction platforms.
