The White House's "official" teleprompter operator used insider knowledge from previewing speech scripts to predict market movements and earn over $100,000, treating Trump like his personal "ATM."

Original by Odaily Planet Daily (@OdailyChina)

Author｜Golem (@web3_golem)

Recently, another insider trading scandal has been uncovered at the White House.

A White House staffer made hundreds of thousands of dollars in profit through insider information trading on prediction markets. The true identity of this insider was merely an operator responsible for Trump's teleprompter for years. The employee has now been suspended without pay.

This teleprompter operator becomes the third insider profiting significantly from prediction markets using insider information disclosed by the U.S. Department of Justice, following a special forces soldier involved in the Maduro capture operation and a Google security engineer. (Related reading: 《After 4 Months, Polymarket Helped Trump Catch the Military Operation Leaker, But at What Cost...》《Seeing the Answers Before Taking the Test? Google Engineer Caught in Polymarket Insider Trading Case》)

Reported by Kalshi, Funds Frozen, but Avoided Criminal Liability

The protagonist is Gabriel Perez, who had been operating Trump's teleprompter since 2016. Perez's journey to this job was quite dramatic. In 2016, Trump's campaign urgently needed a teleprompter operator. They searched Google for "teleprompter," found Perez's company, and thus Perez was hired by the Trump team.

Gabriel Perez

Although Perez was hired somewhat by chance, over these ten years, he gradually became one of Trump's closest aides. Politico even stated, "Perez has become the only person Trump trusts," often receiving last-minute revisions for public speeches directly from Trump himself.

Therefore, Perez was among the few who could access Trump’s complete speech scripts in advance and essentially had final review authority over nearly all of Trump's prepared remarks. The power of this role was significant; Perez's official White House title was Deputy Assistant to the President and Technical Advisor, with an annual salary of $175,000—only $20,000 less than senior staff like Chief of Staff Susie Wiles and Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt.

While such remuneration places him among high earners in the U.S., the greedy Perez was not satisfied.

When prediction markets became popular, countless players began betting on whether Trump would mention specific words during his speeches. Perez realized that his "privilege" could bring him even more wealth.

CFTC investigators found that over approximately three months, Perez placed bets on more than a dozen of Trump's speeches, yielding total profits exceeding $100,000. These included Trump's primetime speech in December last year, his address at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland in January this year, the State of the Union in February, and his Medal of Honor ceremony speech in March.

The annual statutory salary of the U.S. President is $400,000, which, along with various allowances, totals around $569,000 annually. If Perez hadn't been caught, making $100,000 in three months, although his power was less than the President's, his yearly income would have exceeded the President's salary.

But even with prior knowledge of the speech content, Perez couldn't always successfully predict which words Trump would actually mention, as Trump often "improvised" away from the script. When Trump skipped a word Perez had bet on during a speech, he would immediately sell it to cut losses. Trump himself admitted during a speech at the Detroit Economic Club in January that he doesn't look at the teleprompter 80% of the time.

Just like the special forces soldier and the Google security engineer, Perez's exposure stemmed from a voluntary report by the prediction market platform. Perez frequently used Kalshi for insider trading. Starting in March this year, Kalshi's monitoring system detected anomalous trades related to specific words mentioned in Trump's speeches, flagging Perez.

After concluding its internal investigation, Kalshi swiftly froze over $90,000 in Perez's account and handed the case over to the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). Upon learning of this, Trump commented, "This is disgraceful," and personally decided to suspend Perez without pay during the suspension period.

Driven by greed, Perez ultimately lost both his winnings and his job. He couldn't retrieve his profits from the prediction markets and lost his original position. However, compared to the special forces soldier and the Google security engineer, Perez was fortunate, as U.S. judicial authorities did not pursue criminal charges against him, meaning he avoided prison.

During the investigation, the CFTC notified federal prosecutors in Manhattan, but they declined to open a criminal investigation. According to sources, CFTC regulators indicated a willingness to reach a settlement with Perez and have discussed terms with him, resulting in a requirement for Perez to return the profits and cease such trading activity going forward.

Perez is Just the Beginning of Cleaning Up Insider Trading in "Mention" Markets

Perez avoided prison because prosecutors determined his actions did not constitute a criminal offense—he neither leaked crucial government information nor threatened national security. As Trump said, "It's just disgraceful," undermining the integrity of public officials.

In March this year, the White House warned staff against using non-public information for betting on prediction markets. White House spokesperson Davis Ingle stated, "The White House has strict ethical guidelines, and we expect all staff and officials to adhere to them."

But Perez is certainly not the only White House staffer profiting from insider information, and Trump himself, who openly operates paid groups, is hardly qualified to criticize this teleprompter operator (Related reading: $100,000 a Month, Trump Starts Selling 'Alpha').

It's no wonder Perez couldn't resist temptation. The "mention" market in prediction markets is indeed the easiest category to manipulate. When the cost for insiders to participate is extremely low, yet the potential rewards are extremely high, it ceases to be merely an ethical issue and becomes a mechanism design problem. In the face of profit, even outwardly respectable and morally righteous politicians cannot guarantee they will never cross that line.

The "mention" market operates by users betting on specific words, phrases, or topics that will be mentioned in public speeches. Compared to other events (like political elections, sports events, etc.), the cost of cheating in the "mention" market is extremely low. It's not limited to people like Perez who know the speech content in advance; for the speaker themselves, cheating is as easy as uttering a sentence, turning a common saying into a literal profit machine.

At the Grammy Awards ceremony in February this year, after host Trevor Noah said, "Welcome back to the Grammys," he suddenly shouted "Potato." While everyone was bewildered, Trevor Noah continued, "If you bet me saying this word on Polymarket, you'll be rich," and congratulated user "Noah 22." However, the prediction "What will be mentioned at the Grammys" on Polymarket didn't even have "potato" as an option, and the user "noah-22" was entirely fictitious.

Grammy host shouting 'potato' at the ceremony

Some later analysis suggested this was a Polymarket marketing stunt, but it already demonstrated the speaker's ability to manipulate the "mention" market.

An even more direct example: during Coinbase's Q3 2025 earnings call, as the call was nearing its end, CEO Brian Armstrong noticed many people betting on what words he would mention during the call. He then opened Polymarket and, reading verbatim from the options, uttered every single word listed, ultimately causing the market's outcomes to all be 100% winners, resulting in a tie.

These are just two examples showcasing the control speakers have over the "mention" market. Undoubtedly, many others are genuinely profiting while staying under the radar. However, as regulatory oversight of prediction markets intensifies, the "mention" market's insiders may eventually be fully purged, with Perez being just the beginning.

Last month, Kalshi updated its policy requiring users to disclose their employers. Kalshi's Enforcement Director, Bobby DeNault, explained the rationale: "If, due to your employment or work relationship, you possess certain information for which you bear a related legal duty, you have an obligation not to appropriate that information for yourself or use it for private purposes." Polymarket has not yet imposed such strict disclosure requirements on its users, but in the increasingly compliance-oriented prediction market landscape, stricter compliance standards from Polymarket are likely on the horizon.

From special forces soldiers and Google engineers to the White House teleprompter operator, prediction markets are systematically cleaning up insider trading. Simultaneously, the market is undergoing a process of disenchantment. We once thought it reflected collective intelligence, but in reality, it was merely an ATM for a select few insiders.

While purging insider trading makes prediction markets more compliant, it also moves them further from the truth and closer to being pure casinos.