The Wisconsin Elections Commission issued a formal warning this week, deciding that if you put your own money on the line in a prediction market like Kalshi or Polymarket, you forfeit your right to vote in that election.
“We want voters to understand that they cannot legally make a bet on an election and cast a ballot in that same election,” the state’s elections chief said in a statement released Tuesday. Commission officials cited Wisconsin Statute 6.03(2), a provision dating to 1849 that bars anyone who has “made or become directly or indirectly interested in any bet or wager depending upon the result of the election” from voting in it. Violators face potential ballot challenges, disqualification of their vote, and Class I felony election-fraud charges carrying up to 3½ years in prison and a $10,000 fine.
The guidance, adopted earlier this month and amplified Tuesday, arrives just as prediction markets are seeing real engagement from Wisconsinites. Kalshi’s contract on the Aug. 11 Democratic gubernatorial primary alone has exceeded $1.7 million in trading volume, with Francesca Hong currently leading the odds. Markets also exist on attorney-general and congressional contests.
Platforms pushed back hard. Kalshi spokesman Jack Such said the commission “is wrong” in treating its contracts as bets. “Congress itself has defined ‘bet or wager’ to exclude trades on Kalshi,” he said, pointing to the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act. “Kalshi has hundreds of thousands of users in Wisconsin. Implying they can’t vote because they use Kalshi is not only dishonest fearmongering, it is blatant voter suppression and damaging to democracy.”
Polymarket said the action “runs counter to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission’s established framework for regulating prediction markets.”
That federal framework is the core conflict. Kalshi operates as a CFTC-designated contract market. Federal courts and the CFTC have treated these markets as legitimate financial instruments, not bets. The CFTC has already sued Wisconsin over the state’s separate efforts to shut down sports-related contracts on the same platforms, asserting exclusive federal jurisdiction and preemption of state law. The same logic applies to political event contracts, but apparently, WEC is choosing to ignore the ruling.
Even the WEC admits they won’t be launching a witch hunt—at least not yet. Unless you’re foolish enough to brag about your trades in public, they claim you’re safe. But the threat is out there, hanging over every voter who dared to participate in a prediction market. All it takes is one activist or political opponent to challenge your ballot, and suddenly your right to vote is up for grabs. That’s not election integrity; that’s intimidation by bureaucracy.
Even the WEC admits they won’t be launching a witch hunt for violators by subpoenaing platform records, yet. Chairman Don Millis said staff would act only if someone publicly brags about a trade and a formal challenge is filed. All it takes is one activist or political opponent to challenge your ballot, and suddenly WEC is coming to cancel out your vote.
Let’s be clear: this 177-year-old law was written in an era when the telegraph was cutting-edge technology, not when Americans could trade election outcomes from their phones. Applying it to modern, federally regulated markets is like using a horse-and-buggy rulebook to police the internet. The result? Wisconsin citizens are told to pick between participating in a national financial market and exercising their right to vote—a false choice that federal regulators have already said the state has no business imposing.
The 177-year-old statute was written long before federally regulated prediction markets existed. Applying it to modern, federally regulated markets is like using a horse-and-buggy rulebook to police the internet. Wisconsin citizens are told to pick between participating in a national financial market and exercising their right to vote — a choice federal regulators say the state has no authority to impose.
