The US Justice Department says an active‑duty special forces soldier has been arrested after allegedly using classified information to profit from bets on the timing of the Trump administration’s operation to seize Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro.
Master Sergeant Gannon Ken Van Dyke, an Army special‑operations member who participated in planning and carrying out the early‑January mission, was indicted on charges that include unlawful use of confidential government information for personal gain, theft of nonpublic government information, commodities fraud, wire fraud and making an unlawful monetary transaction, the DOJ said.
Authorities say Van Dyke placed 13 wagers totaling about $33,000 on the prediction market Polymarket, taking “yes” positions on questions about whether US forces would invade Venezuela and remove Maduro before the end of January. Prosecutors allege those bets yielded more than $400,000 in illicit profits after the operation.
President Donald Trump, asked about the charges, said he was not aware of them and compared the situation to baseball player Pete Rose betting on his own team, saying it would be problematic only if someone bet against their team’s success. Earlier this year Trump posted that he planned to pardon Rose, noting Rose had only gambled on his team to win.
The indictment was unsealed amid growing concerns that people close to the administration are trading on inside information. Critics and watchdogs have raised alarms about what they view as a permissive culture toward personal enrichment from nonpublic knowledge.
“This soldier was probably just copying what he’s seeing elsewhere,” Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D‑Ill.) said, arguing that insider trading and corruption begin at the top and spread through government.
Brian Finucane, senior adviser to the US Program at the International Crisis Group, called it unusual for a service member to be arrested over bets linked to an operation they helped conduct and said he hoped investigations would determine who is accountable for what he described as the lawless use of military force.
Officials and observers have pointed to other suspiciously timed wagers tied to national security actions. Reports have also surfaced about attempts by brokers connected to senior officials to make large investments ahead of major events in the Middle East; the Financial Times reported a broker for Pentagon Secretary Pete Hegseth tried to place multimillion‑dollar bets on weapons stocks in the weeks before a US‑Israeli attack on Iran.
Sen. Chris Murphy (D‑Conn.), who is sponsoring legislation to bar wagering on government actions, terrorism, war, assassination and events where an individual knows or controls the outcome, described the situation as evidence that the Iran conflict has become a profit opportunity for those close to the president.
The DOJ indictment of Van Dyke adds to scrutiny over whether insiders used privileged information for financial gain and intensifies calls for tighter rules and enforcement to prevent wagering on government operations.
(Source: Common Dreams)
