Kalshi, the online prediction market platform, has finally had enough of George Santos, issuing the company’s first-ever lifetime ban to the former Republican congressman. He is accused of violating Kalshi’s rules regarding insider trading and market manipulation, and was awarded a fine of more than $71,000. Santos is a convicted fraudster who served in New York’s 3rd congressional district for less than a year before he was expelled from Congress in 2023. He later served time in prison, pleading guilty to wire fraud, aggravated identity theft and other charges, but President Donald Trump commuted his sentence in October 2025.
As Wired reports, “the former politician placed trades in markets related to whether he would attend President Trump’s State of the Union address in February 2026. He then ‘began making a series of public statements regarding his attendance at the event in an attempt to influence the price’ of certain contracts, some of which were ‘false or misleading,’ per the notice.”
