A group of U.S. lawmakers has called on the United States Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) to ban betting on the outcomes of the upcoming 2024 presidential elections in the country.
Senators Jeff Merkley, Richard Blumenthal, and Elizabeth Warren, along with Representatives Jamie Raskin and John Sarbanes, expressed their concerns in a recent letter to CFTC Chair Rostin Behnam.
The lawmakers argued that allowing betting markets on elections could enable wealthy individuals to manipulate election outcomes through large wagers, potentially undermining public trust in the democratic process.
“Elections are not a for-profit enterprise,”
the group stated in their letter, which was written in support of a rule proposed by the Commission in May to ban election betting.
“Without this rule, voters will wonder if their vote mattered, and the whether the outcome of the election was influenced by big money bets,”
they wrote.
The group’s call for action comes just three months before the 2024 presidential election in November. The lawmakers claimed the U.S. electoral system already faces significant issues, including the influence of dark money in campaigns and the threat of extremism. They urged the CFTC to take action to protect the integrity of U.S. elections as such practices could shift motivations away from genuine political beliefs towards financial gain.
“Election gambling fundamentally cheapens the sanctity of our democratic process. Political bets change the motivations behind each vote, replacing political convictions with financial calculations,”
the lawmakers cautioned.
Meanwhile, this push for a ban is not without international precedent. Taiwanese prosecutors recently charged a man for using the crypto-betting platform Polymarket to wager on the country’s 2024 elections. The individual, identified only as “Chen,” allegedly bet approximately 472 USDC on a specific presidential candidate and 60 USD on a party winning more legislative seats.
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