Comment Text:
Allowing betting on the outcomes of elections will encourage election interference, abuse of election officials, and other misconduct to maximize people’s winnings.
In the 2020 election cycle, we saw mistrust of our elections spread like wildfire.
While far-right conspiracy theories around the 2020 Election are baseless, the last thing we need is a legitimate reason for people to question the outcomes of our elections:
Malicious bettors could use artificial intelligence to create false or misleading videos aimed at changing popular opinion and maximizing their chances of winning a bet
People could intimidate election officials in order to win bets, or harass and accuse them or wrongdoing if the outcome loses them money
Politics is already a team sport, where people root for their party rather than learning about policy. Political betting would only make people even more singularly focused on the success of their party and not what governments are actually doing
The CFTC should not add fuel to the fire of election conspiracy theories or ambush election officials with attacks from highly-motivated bettors.
Betting on election results is a terrible idea: It would decrease trust in our democracy and increase conspiracy theories and harassment of election officials.
Please CFTC: just say NO and do not allow betting on election results.
