President Donald Trump is throwing his weight behind the fast-growing world of prediction markets in their fight against state gambling regulators.
In a Truth Social post, Trump took aim at several officials whose states have sought to clamp down on prediction market platforms like Kalshi and Crypto.com, saying it's "critically important" that federal regulators at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission oversee the companies and "that they will thrive."
"Under my leadership, we are setting 'rules of the road' that are the Gold Standard for the States," Trump wrote Tuesday. "We cannot have SCUM like Chris Christie, Letitia James, Tim Walz, and JB Pritzker setting the rules!"
"Other Countries are after this new form of Financial Market, and we want to remain at the top," he added.
The prediction markets — or financial exchanges that offer wagers on everything from the midterm elections and Major League Baseball games to the weather — have gone mainstream over the last year and a half, as users have flocked to their platforms. But Trump's post underscores the growing political stakes around the high-flying industry, whose rise has unsettled lawmakers on both sides of the aisle and sparked a growing legal battle over their regulation.
State officials argue that the markets are flouting gambling regulations. That includes New York, where James, the state's attorney general, sued Coinbase and Gemini earlier this year over their prediction-market platforms, and Illinois, where officials sent cease-and-desist letters to prediction market operators. Earlier this month, Walz, the governor of Minnesota, signed the first state law expressly prohibiting prediction markets.
The prediction markets counter that they are exclusively regulated by the CFTC, a small but powerful financial watchdog. And the agency — led by Chair Michael Selig, a Trump appointee — has firmly backed the companies' fight, including through lawsuits against states like New York, Illinois and Minnesota over their crackdown efforts.
Spokespeople for James, Walz and Pritzker did not immediately respond to requests for comment. A spokesperson for the American Gaming Association — a critic of the prediction markets that counts Christie as an adviser — did not have an immediate comment.
Trump has his own connections to the industry as well. The president’s eldest son, Donald Trump Jr., is an adviser to Kalshi and an investor in Polymarket through the venture capital firm 1789 Capital, where he works as a partner. And Trump Media & Technology Group — the social media company that counts Trump as its largest shareholder — has announced plans to offer prediction markets itself.
Prediction market backers and critics alike have brought on a range of well-known political names to make their cases in the media, on Capitol Hill and in the courts. They include former White House Deputy chief of staff and longtime Trump adviser Taylor Budowich, who recently signed on to lead a new Kalshi-backed group called Americans for Fair Markets.
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