The Levin Letter: Betting on War and Death Should Never Be a Sport
Seventy-one minutes before the news broke that the United States had struck Iran, someone placed a bet on a prediction market platform that it would happen. A Polymarket account called “Magamyman” walked away with more than half a million dollars within minutes. We don’t know who was behind that account or what information they had access to beforehand, but someone profited off a bet that our service members would be put in harm’s way.
War is not a commodity. Human life is not a trading opportunity. The idea that you can open an app, land on a market asking whether a foreign leader will be assassinated, and place a bet should strike every decent person as morally obscene. And yet, here we are.
This is also a question of market integrity and national security. When someone profits from advance knowledge of a military strike, that is not savvy investing. It is the kind of insider advantage that undermines trust in our institutions and potentially compromises classified information. Every American who believes in fair markets and honest government should want answers.
That’s why I introduced the DEATH BETS Act, a bicameral bill that would explicitly prohibit any Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC)-registered entity from listing any contract that involves, relates to, or references terrorism, assassination, war, or the death of any individual. No exceptions.
The prediction market industry has shown it cannot be trusted to police itself. Under existing CFTC regulations, markets on war and assassination are supposed to be prohibited when they are determined to be contrary to the public interest, but that determination has been left entirely to the Commission’s discretion. I believe that discretion can no longer be relied upon to protect the public.
When regulation falls short, the platforms get creative. They invented a legal fiction to hide behind, calling these “regime change” markets. They insist you are betting on whether a foreign leader will still hold power, not whether he will be killed. That is a distinction without a moral difference, and everyone involved knows it.
Also, platforms like Polymarket operate offshore, which means existing CFTC jurisdiction may not reach them at all. The “Magamyman” trades may have occurred in a complete regulatory vacuum: no oversight, no accountability, no mechanism to ask the basic questions this situation demands.
This is not an abstract concern. Prediction markets on death and destruction create a financial motive for people to want bad things to happen. More dangerously, they create conditions under which those with inside knowledge of government actions can profit from tragedy before the public even learns it has occurred. That should concern anyone who cares about the integrity of our military and the security of our classified information.
The DEATH BETS Act states clearly in law what should already be obvious in principle: you cannot build a financial product out of human suffering. You cannot allow people to profit from advance knowledge of military strikes. And you cannot allow platforms to launder these markets through creative naming and offshore incorporation.
Protecting our troops and protecting the integrity of our markets are not competing values. Congress should act now.
By: Rep. Mike Levin
Source: Picket Fence Media