Comer Seeks Limits or Ban on Official Prediction-Market Trading

House Oversight Committee Chair James Comer has urged lawmakers to restrict government officials from trading on prediction markets. The options he has raised range from new regulatory safeguards to an outright prohibition, according to coverage from Crypto Economy and Crypto.news. The proposed action follows a House Oversight Committee investigation that reviewed about 1,700 pages of documents. Crypto Economy reports that investigators also held multiple briefings with prediction-market platforms including Polymarket and Kalshi, placing the proposal within a review of how government officials interact with the sector. The two outlets corroborate the central elements of the story: Comer’s call for restrictions, the possibility of a complete ban and the roughly 1,700-page evidentiary review. Crypto Economy characterizes the investigation as exhaustive and provides the detail about platform briefings, while Crypto.news identifies the committee’s Nov. 13 release as the source of its report. Neither account presents a conflicting figure or outcome.

Polymarket is one of the platforms involved in the inquiry, and DeFiLlama reports $317.04 million in total value locked, a 2.8% increase over seven days. That platform-level growth occurred alongside a broadly weaker broader crypto market, showing that the policy debate concerns an active market even as conditions across digital assets remain subdued.

The wider market context is defensive: total crypto market capitalization stands at $2.34 trillion, Bitcoin is down 2.57% over 24 hours and the Fear & Greed index is at 13, labeled Extreme Fear. No specific coin from the market-data list is tied to the legislative proposal. The immediate issue to watch is the scope and form of any restrictions on official participation, including whether lawmakers pursue a limited conflict-of-interest regime or the broader ban Comer has suggested.