FairPredicts launches ad campaign in D.C. targeting Kalshi ahead of Senate hearing

FairPredicts, a new political nonprofit positioning itself as a prediction market watchdog, is launching a six-figure advertising campaign in Washington, D.C., targeting Kalshi as lawmakers prepare to examine the expansion of gambling and prediction markets.

The Senate Commerce Committee is set to hold a hearing examining the expansion of gambling and prediction markets this week. The group, which bills itself as a nonpartisan group that holds “the prediction market industry accountable,” has timed the campaign to coincide with the hearing.

“This hearing will examine how we strengthen oversight, protect the credibility of competition and address the growing exposure of young people and children to betting platforms,” said Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., who chairs the Senate committee holding the hearings.

The hearing is scheduled to feature four witnesses: Bill Miller, president and CEO of the American Gaming Association; Mary Beth Thomas, executive director of the Tennessee Sports Wagering Council; Scott Sadin, co-founder of Integrity Compliance 360; and Patrick McHenry, a senior adviser for the Coalition for Prediction Markets.

FairPredicts has directed particular criticism at Kalshi, one of the largest prediction market operators. Kalshi spent nearly $500,000 in 2026 lobbying Congress and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the federal agency that regulates the industry.

“FairPredicts is launching today as a nonpartisan market integrity watchdog with one clear mission: holding Kalshi and other prediction market operators accountable for the growing gap between what they tell the public and what they actually do,” the group said in a statement to NBC News.

Kalshi responded by questioning FairPredicts’ funding and suggesting the campaign may be connected to casino interests.

“Smells like a casino-led effort,” Kalshi spokeswoman Elizabeth Diana said. “Prediction markets are fair, transparent, and open. Casinos limit winners (unfair), price with algorithms (opaque), and set the odds themselves (closed). FairPredicts or UnfairPredicts?”

The fight is unfolding amid a commercial and political battle between sports betting companies and prediction market operators. The legalization of sports gambling and regulatory approval of prediction markets have intensified competition for consumers, producing heavy spending on advertising and lobbying.

Some of the largest sports betting platforms recently contributed more than $40 million to a super PAC focused mainly on influencing state legislative races.

In the meantime, Kalshi and other prediction market platforms have faced questions over market integrity. In February, under growing pressure, Kalshi said it had opened 200 investigations into alleged insider trading, including two cases it referred to the CFTC, as required by law.

“No system is perfect. No financial exchange is immune from bad actors,” the company said at the time. “Not stock exchanges, not banks, not prediction markets. We’re committed to deterring and finding the bad actors, manipulators, and those who willingly cheat.”

Last month, Kalshi fined and suspended three political candidates for “insider trading” on their own campaigns. One of them, Mark Moran, a Democrat running for U.S. Senate in Virginia, told NBC News he placed the bet intentionally to highlight the potential for prediction markets to affect politics.

Concerns have also extended beyond Kalshi. Last month, federal authorities arrested U.S. special forces soldier Gannon Ken Van Dyke over allegations that he used classified information about the operation that led to the arrest of Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro to make $409,000 on Polymarket.

President Donald Trump downplayed the arrest because Van Dyke had bet that the military would successfully capture Maduro, comparing it to baseball great Pete Rose betting on the Cincinnati Reds when he played for and coached the team. Rose had been under a lifetime ban from baseball until recently.

Trump Media announced last year that prediction markets would become available on the Truth Social website through Crypto.com. Donald Trump Jr. is the company’s sole trustee after Donald Trump transferred his majority shares into a revocable trust before taking office last year.

The Senate has already moved to limit potential conflicts within Congress. Last month, it approved a bipartisan resolution banning senators from using prediction markets.

“We must never allow Congress to turn into a casino where members representing the public can gamble on wars and economic crises or elections,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said on the Senate floor when the resolution was introduced.