{"id":753705,"date":"2026-08-29T16:04:12","date_gmt":"2026-08-29T16:04:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/753705\/"},"modified":"2026-08-29T16:04:12","modified_gmt":"2026-08-29T16:04:12","slug":"ex-white-house-teleprompter-operator-fined-172000-for-trump-speech-bets-trump-administration","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/753705\/","title":{"rendered":"Ex-White House teleprompter operator fined $172,000 for Trump speech bets | Trump administration"},"content":{"rendered":"

A White House teleprompter operator who left his post<\/a> amid accusations that he used inside knowledge to make bets on Donald Trump<\/a>\u2019s speeches on an online prediction market has been fined $172,000, according to federal regulators.<\/p>\n

Gabriel Perez exploited \u201cmaterial, nonpublic information\u201d that he gathered through his work for the president in order to place wagers on the Kalshi platform \u201cfor his personal benefit\u201d, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) maintained in a news release<\/a> on Friday.<\/p>\n

The CFTC ordered Perez to both \u201cdisgorge the profits he made from his unlawful [conduct]\u201d totaling $107,539.02 and to pay a civil penalty of $65,000, the agency\u2019s news release said. Such amounts represented \u201ca substantial discount\u201d, the CFTC added, attributing that to what the agency called \u201cPerez\u2019s exemplary cooperation\u201d with its investigation into him.<\/p>\n

According to the CFTC, from December to February while working as a White House teleprompter operator, Perez made bets on Kalshi tied to words or phrases that Trump might make during his speeches. Perez\u2019s White House role gave him access to those speeches before the president delivered them, and he \u201cmisappropriated that information\u201d to profit, breaching \u201chis duty of trust and confidence\u201d, the CFTC asserted.<\/p>\n

Perez \u2013 beside being fined \u2013 \u201cagreed to cease and desist from further violations\u201d of federal laws prohibiting market manipulation and CFTC regulations, the CFTC said. He was also handed a three-year trading ban.<\/p>\n

The CFTC issued its news release about Perez on Friday, about a month after the White House said he no longer had his job there. It was unclear whether Perez resigned or was fired.<\/p>\n

Yet his departure came after he was reportedly put on unpaid leave<\/a> amid an investigation into whether he had used his inside knowledge to win more than $100,000 betting on what Trump would say on big occasions, including his State of the Union address in February. The White House press secretary at the time, Karoline Leavitt, had described the reports of insider trading by Perez as \u201cdeeply unfortunate and, frankly, a disgrace\u201d.<\/p>\n

Perez earned an annual salary of $175,000 for his teleprompter work, according to White House personnel records<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The case centering on Perez was only the latest to illustrate the continued proliferation of online prediction markets, which allow users to place speculative bets on public events and trends. That has evidently incentivized insider trading.<\/p>\n

For instance, about four months before Perez\u2019s fine, federal prosecutors indicted US soldier Gannon Ken Van Dyke for allegedly making a $400,000 bet on Kalshi rival platform Polymarket about whether Nicol\u00e1s Maduro would be removed from Venezuela\u2019s presidency. Van Dyke had worked on the operation to remove Maduro and extradite him to the US on drug-trafficking charges, according to prosecutors.<\/p>\n

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Furthermore, Kalshi in April also announced<\/a> fines against three political candidates who bet on their own elections, including one who wagered on whether he would run for office before announcing an independent campaign for a US Senate seat in Virginia.<\/p>\n

Trump has defended<\/a> the prediction market industry, to which his family has business ties. He has advocated against individual US states regulating those markets and has argued that the CFTC should instead carry out that function.<\/p>\n

In its news release on Perez\u2019s fine, meanwhile, the CFTC made it a point to thank Kalshi for its \u201cassistance \u2026 in this matter\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A White House teleprompter operator who left his post amid accusations that he used inside knowledge to make…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":753706,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49,50,51,47,52,48],"class_list":["post-753705","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/753705","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=753705"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/753705\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/753706"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=753705"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=753705"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=753705"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}