US soldier charged with using classified intel to win $400K Polymarket
bet on Maduro raid
[April 24, 2026]
By HALLIE GOLDEN, KONSTANTIN TOROPIN and HANNAH SCHOENBAUM
WASHINGTON (AP) — A U.S. special forces soldier involved in the military
operation to capture Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro has been
charged with using classified information about the mission to win more
than $400,000 in an online betting market, federal officials announced
Thursday.
Gannon Ken Van Dyke was part of the operation to capture Maduro in
January and used his access to classified information to make money on
the prediction market site Polymarket, the federal prosecutor’s office
in New York said.
He has been charged by the Justice Department with unlawful use of
confidential government information for personal gain, theft of
nonpublic government information, commodities fraud, wire fraud and
making an unlawful monetary transaction. He could face years in prison.
Van Dyke, 38, was involved in the planning and execution of capturing
Maduro for about a month beginning Dec. 8, 2025, according to the
federal prosecutor’s office. Even though he signed nondisclosure
agreements promising to not divulge “any classified or sensitive
information” related to the operations, prosecutors say the Army soldier
used this information to make a series of bets related to Maduro being
out of power by Jan. 31, 2026.
“This involved a U.S. soldier who allegedly took advantage of his
position to profit off of a righteous military operation,” FBI Director
Kash Patel said in a post to social media.
A telephone number listed for Van Dyke in public records was not in
service. There was not yet an attorney listed for him in court
documents.
Polymarket, one of the largest prediction markets in the world, said it
had found someone trading on classified government information, alerted
the U.S. Department of Justice and “cooperated with their
investigation.”
“Insider trading has no place on Polymarket,” the company said in a
statement.
Second complaint filed against the soldier
The Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the federal agency that
regulates prediction markets, announced Thursday it had filed a parallel
complaint against Van Dyke.
That complaint alleges that Van Dyke moved $35,000 from his personal
bank account into a cryptocurrency exchange account on Dec. 26 — a
little over a week before U.S. forces would fly into Caracas and seize
Maduro.
Van Dyke used more than $32,500 to make a series of bets on when Maduro
might be removed from power, according to the complaint. He placed those
bets between Dec. 30 and Jan. 2, with the vast majority occurring the
night of Jan. 2 — just hours before the first missiles would fall on
Caracas.
In the early hours of Jan. 3, President Donald Trump posted on his
social media platform a photo of the now-captured Venezuelan leader,
wearing a gray sweatsuit, headphones and a blindfold.
The bets Van Dyke made on Maduro leaving power resulted in “more than
$404,000 of profits," the complaint said. Bets on three other
Venezuela-related contracts netted the solider more than $5,000,
according to the document.
“The defendant was entrusted with confidential information about U.S.
operations and yet took action that endangered U.S. national security
and put the lives of American service members in harm’s way," said
Michael Selig, the commission's chairman.
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The massive profits from the well-timed bets aroused public
attention days after the raid and brought bipartisan calls for
stricter regulation of the markets where people can wager on just
about anything.
Officials allege that shortly after the operation, Van Dyke put most
of the money he won in a foreign cryptocurrency vault and then into
a new brokerage account. He also asked Polymarket to delete his
account, saying he had lost access to his email associated with the
account, according to the federal prosecutor’s office.
Trump, when asked about the case Thursday, drew parallels between
the embattled soldier and late professional baseball player Pete
Rose, who was banned from the sport amid accusations that he placed
bets on his own team.
“The whole world, unfortunately, has become somewhat of a casino,
and you look at what’s going on all over the world and Europe and
every place, they’re doing these betting things,” Trump told
reporters.
The Trump administration has been a key ally of the growing
prediction market industry in a critical legal fight with states
seeking to ban the platforms. The president’s eldest son is an
adviser for both Polymarket and its competitor Kalshi, and a
Polymarket investor. Trump’s social media platform Truth Social is
also launching its own cryptocurrency-based prediction market called
Truth Predict.
Nearly two decades in the Army
Van Dyke joined the Army in 2008 and, in 2023, was promoted to the
rank of master sergeant, the second-highest enlisted rank in the
Army, according to the indictment. Federal prosecutors said he was
part of the special forces community and was stationed at Fort Bragg
near Fayetteville, North Carolina, but their indictment offered
little other details about his military service.
The document said Van Dyke was photographed following the raid on
the deck of a ship “wearing U.S. military fatigues, and carrying a
rifle, standing alongside three other individuals wearing U.S.
military fatigues."
The Pentagon referred questions on the case to the Army and the
Justice Department.
Army officials declined to provide Van Dyke's service record.
Typically, the military services are reticent to offer details about
members of the special forces and take measures to keep their
identities secret.
Bets on geopolitical tensions draw scrutiny
The high-profile indictment comes as bipartisan lawmakers are
considering legislation to ban prediction markets from allowing bets
on war, assassinations or terrorist attacks.
Earlier this month, The Associated Press reported that a group of
new accounts on Polymarket made highly specific, well-timed bets on
whether the U.S. and Iran would reach a ceasefire on April 7,
resulting in hundreds of thousands of dollars in profits for the new
customers. On the same day the AP published the report, the White
House warned staff against using private information to trade on
prediction markets.
On Wednesday, Kalshi fined and suspended three congressional
candidates who the company said wagered on the outcome of their own
elections.
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Golden reported from Seattle, and Schoenbaum from Salt Lake City.
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