A White House teleprompter operator who turned advance access to the president's speeches into six figures of prediction-market profits will walk away with a fine and a trading ban — no criminal charges, no jail time, just the cost of doing business for someone who sits close to power.
Gabriel Perez, who has operated Donald Trump's teleprompter since 2016, was ordered Friday by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to surrender $107,539 in trading profits and pay a $65,000 civil penalty after using his early access to presidential remarks to bet on which words and phrases Trump would say in public. The CFTC also imposed a three-year trading ban. Between December 2025 and February 2026, Perez placed 49 trades on Kalshi's "mention markets" and won 39 of them, profiting off events including the State of the Union address, the National Prayer Breakfast, and a Medal of Honor ceremony, according to the CFTC filing.
Here is the part that should anger every American who watches the system work one way for the connected and another for everyone else: Perez admitted in a voluntary interview with investigators that he "made his trading decisions based on the confidential information he had learned from his review of the speeches," according to CNN. He confessed. And yet there is no criminal referral from the Justice Department — just a civil settlement with a regulator.
The CFTC even gave Perez what it called a "substantial discount" on the $65,000 civil penalty because of his "exemplary cooperation." Former CFTC commissioner Christy Goldsmith Romero, a Biden appointee, told CNN the small fine was a missed opportunity: "This is insider trading at the highest level of government — the White House. With this small penalty, the CFTC gave away the chance to send a strong message to deter future insider trading."
It was not the government that caught Perez. It was Kalshi. The platform's surveillance systems flagged trades that did not follow typical patterns and drew complaints from market makers through whistleblower channels. Kalshi froze Perez's account — locking more than $90,000 in profits before he could withdraw — and referred the matter to the CFTC. Kalshi's head of enforcement, Bobby DeNault, posted that the company's investigation caught the staffer and that penalties followed from both the exchange and the CFTC. "It doesn't matter who you are: violate our rules or federal law and you will face the consequences," DeNault wrote.
The White House has been quiet on the settlement. In July, press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Trump had been briefed and considered the conduct "unfortunate" and "a disgrace." A White House official said Perez was no longer in his position but would not say whether he was fired or resigned. CBS News reported that in March, the White House Management Office sent a letter telling aides not to bet on prediction markets with nonpublic information — suggesting the problem was already on officials' radar before Perez's trades came to light.
Perez held one of the most trusted perches in the building: he was often the last person to see the president's speeches before delivery. Proximity to power turned into a profit line, and the penalty is a parking ticket. The open question is whether the Justice Department thinks the same conduct that generates a civil fine for a White House staffer would generate a prison sentence for an ordinary trader — and if not, why.
