Congress wants you to know it's cracking down on congressional gambling—just not the kind where members make real money. Rep. Bryan Steil (R-Wis.) introduced the Stop Lawmakers from Predicting Act on Thursday, barring members of Congress, their spouses, and dependent children from wagering on policy outcomes, government actions, or elections via prediction markets. The penalty: $2,000 or 10% of the wager's value, whichever is greater, plus any profit. Meanwhile, the bill that would actually stop lawmakers from trading individual stocks—a far richer vein of potential corruption—has been sitting idle since February.
The contrast tells you everything. Prediction markets like Kalshi and Polymarket are newer, smaller, and more transparent. The 2026 House control market on Polymarket carries about $7.48 million in volume, according to CryptoSlate's market data—real money, but a rounding error next to congressional stock portfolios. Yet Washington is moving fast on the prediction market issue while the stock trading ban goes nowhere.
Steil, who chairs the House Administration Committee, said in a statement: "The American people deserve to know their Member of Congress is not profiting off insider information. The Stop Lawmakers from Predicting Act ensures that cannot happen." He added that "lawmakers should be writing policy, not wagering on its outcome."
Fair enough. But Decrypt reported that Steil's broader stock-trading ban—which would bar lawmakers, spouses, and dependents from buying new stocks with comparable fines—cleared committee in February and hasn't moved since. Steil has expressed hope for a House vote this summer. Hope is not a legislative strategy.
The prediction market bill also follows a Senate resolution in April that barred its own members and staff from using prediction markets, and a House Oversight Committee investigation in May into Kalshi and Polymarket over what its chairman called a pattern of insider trading on the platforms. So both chambers are energized when it comes to policing the new, visible betting platforms. The old, lucrative game—members sitting on committees that move markets and then trading on that information—gets the slow walk.
Violators of Steil's new bill couldn't use official office funds, taxpayer-funded allowances, or campaign donations to cover fines. Those who leave office without paying would be referred to the Justice Department for civil enforcement. All of which sounds tough—until you remember that the existing STOCK Act, the law supposed to stop congressional insider trading, has produced virtually no enforcement of consequence.
The founders debated whether representatives could be trusted with power over their own affairs. They assumed the public would hold them accountable. Instead, the uniparty protects its monopoly: move fast against the novel threat that exposes information to the public, and stall on the entrenched practice that lets members quietly enrich themselves. Prediction markets make political wagering visible. Stock trades by lawmakers often stay hidden until disclosure deadlines pass. Washington is choosing to ban the sunlight and preserve the shade.
The open question is whether any of this actually becomes law—or whether both bills die so members can keep telling voters they tried.
