Federal investigators believe Gabriel Perez, the teleprompter operator who has worked for President Donald Trump since 2016, used nonpublic information to place wagers on what Trump would say at public events, according to ABC News.
The alleged bets were made on Kalshi, the prediction market where users can wager on the outcomes of future events. One of Kalshi’s offerings is a “mentions” market, where users bet on whether a public figure will use particular words or topics during a speech or other high-profile appearance.
ABC News reported that Perez is accused of betting on Trump’s remarks at more than a dozen events. The allegation is straightforward: if a person involved in producing a speech knows what is loaded into the president’s teleprompter, that person may have an informational edge over ordinary users guessing from the outside.
That is the whole problem with speech-betting markets. They look like trivia until someone close to the production pipeline has access to the script. A market asking whether Trump will mention a given subject depends on uncertainty. A teleprompter operator, investigators reportedly believe, may have had less of it.
Kalshi has become one of the most prominent U.S. prediction market platforms, offering contracts tied to politics, culture, business, and other public events. Its mentions markets turn language itself into a tradable event: users are not betting on an election result or a policy outcome, but on the contents of a person’s remarks.
ABC News attributed the claims about Perez to federal investigators. The report says investigators believe he used inside information, but the available account does not include a public charging document, a plea, or a final court finding. Perez is therefore accused, not adjudicated, based on the facts reported so far.
The case also puts Kalshi’s market design under scrutiny. Prediction markets depend on confidence that participants are not trading against people with privileged access to the answer. In financial markets, insider trading rules are built around that concern. In speech markets, the same basic risk appears in a stranger package: someone close enough to a podium may know what the crowd is about to hear.
Kalshi’s position, according to the report reflected in The Verge’s coverage, is that it identified the alleged activity. ABC News reported the core allegation: federal investigators believe Trump’s longtime teleprompter operator placed wagers using information unavailable to regular Kalshi users.
This story draws on original reporting from The Verge.
