Legislators Seek To Ban Betting On Political ElectionsMove Comes After Billions Were Bet In 2024 |
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The 2024 U.S. election saw billions of dollars wagered on who would be the next president, and now two lawmakers are seeking to make the practice illegal.
Democratic representatives Jamie Raskin and Andrea Salinas have introduced the “Ban Gambling on Elections Act,” hoping to see Congress leave Americans as election voters and observers rather than bettors. Senator Jeff Merkley (D) introduced a similar bill earlier this year in the Senate.
“With distrust in our electoral system at an all-time high, we must crack down on gambling in all U.S. elections,” Raskin said. “Our democracy demands reliable and transparent processes to cast ballots and tally results, not a horserace clouded by gambling odds and bets placed.”
Eliminating Bad Actors
The representatives argue that introducing “bad actors” into the election process could jeopardize the result and bring about even more corruption.
Betting sites have argued that these types of wagers should be seen as “event-based derivative contracts” more akin to regulated financial instruments rather than gambling on a football or basketball game.
Some backers of election betting also note that these types of bets allow Americans to gauge just how popular the candidates really are as selectors use their own money in picking a winner. Betting numbers have been used by the media over the last few election cycles to handicap elections in combination with traditional polling.
However, critics have argued that big-money bettors could have more sway in the markets on election betting sites like Kalshi, Polymarket, Betfair, and PredictIt, which produce odds on candidates’ chance of winning based on the betting numbers. The new bill’s backers worry this could affect the results.
“When you don’t have limits, then it is the deep pockets which moves the prices,” Thomas Gruca, a marketing professor at the University of Iowa’s Tippie College of Business, recently told the BBC. “Your opinion is weighted by the size of your cheque book.”
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