A U.S. servicemember accused of using government information to win more than $400,000 on Polymarket is challenging the Commodity Futures Trading Commission’s first insider trading lawsuit involving event contracts.
Attorneys for Gannon Ken Van Dyke previewed a planned motion to dismiss in a July 6 pre-motion letter. The lawyers argue the CFTC lacks authority because the trades at issue were “geopolitical bets,” not swaps covered by federal commodities law.
The CFTC sued Van Dyke in April, the same day the Justice Department announced a separate criminal case over the alleged trading. The CFTC’s civil lawsuit alleges Van Dyke used classified or sensitive nonpublic information tied to a U.S. military operation to profit from Polymarket contracts connected to Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro’s removal from power.
Van Dyke’s attorneys are now attacking the legal foundation of the CFTC’s case.
“Such geopolitical bets are not ‘swaps’ subject to the Commodities Exchange Act, as the CFTC contends, and therefore cannot form the basis of liability,” Van Dyke’s attorneys wrote.
Defense says trades were bets, not swaps
The July 6 filing is not a full motion to dismiss. It is a pre-motion letter asking U.S. District Judge Andrew Carter for a conference before Van Dyke files that motion.
But the letter previews the core argument Van Dyke’s attorneys plan to make: The CFTC cannot sue him under the Commodity Exchange Act unless the Polymarket contracts at issue were swaps.
That issue runs through the CFTC’s complaint. The agency alleged the January Maduro contract was a swap because it depended on Maduro’s removal from power, an event the CFTC said carried potential financial, economic or commercial consequences. The complaint cited possible effects on global crude oil prices, Venezuelan government bonds and Venezuela’s currency, the bolívar.
Van Dyke’s attorneys argue that stretches the statute too far. The filing says the contracts were not tied to a financial product, benchmark or economic exposure, but instead allowed users to wager on a geopolitical event.
The defense also previewed a second argument aimed at CFTC Regulation 180.1, the agency’s anti-fraud and anti-manipulation rule. The CFTC is using that rule to allege Van Dyke engaged in a deceptive scheme “in connection with” a swap, but Van Dyke’s attorneys argue the regulation exceeds the authority Congress gave the agency.
Together, the arguments would attack the case on two levels, claiming the trades were not swaps at all and that the CFTC’s anti-fraud rule cannot be used this way even if the trades were covered by commodities law.
CFTC says Van Dyke used military information to trade
The CFTC’s complaint says Van Dyke was an active-duty member of the U.S. Army’s Special Forces assigned to U.S. Army Special Operations Command (USASOC) when he acquired information about Operation Absolute Resolve, a U.S. military operation to capture and arrest Maduro.
According to the complaint, Van Dyke received a classified information security briefing and signed a nondisclosure agreement in December 2025, agreeing not to disclose classified or sensitive information tied to USASOC operations. The CFTC alleges Van Dyke then used nonpublic government information from the operation to trade contracts tied to Maduro’s removal from power.
The agency says Van Dyke bought more than 436,000 “Yes” shares in a contract on Polymarket’s global platform asking whether Maduro would be removed from power by Jan. 31, 2026. The contract resolved to “Yes” after Maduro’s capture was publicly announced, generating more than $404,000 in profit, according to the complaint.
The CFTC is seeking civil monetary penalties, disgorgement, restitution, trading and registration bans, and a court order barring future violations.
Swap question also sits at center of state fights
The same swaps question has become central in Kalshi’s fights with state regulators, including in New Jersey, Michigan and Ohio. State officials argue that sports event contracts should be treated as gambling, while Kalshi argues they are federally regulated swaps.
That classification matters because it supports the broader preemption argument. If sports event contracts are swaps traded on a CFTC-regulated exchange, Kalshi can argue that states cannot block them under gambling laws. If they are just bets, the state-regulator argument becomes much stronger.
Van Dyke’s filing uses the same basic pressure point against the CFTC itself, arguing the agency cannot bring an insider trading case unless the Polymarket contracts first qualify as swaps.
A dismissal of the CFTC suit on the grounds that the contracts were not swaps would give state regulators another ruling to point to in the legal fight over whether event contracts are federally regulated swaps or bets outside the CFTC’s authority.
What dismissal could mean
The related criminal case is already moving separately from the CFTC lawsuit. The DOJ charged Van Dyke with unlawful use of confidential government information for personal gain, theft of nonpublic government information, commodities fraud, wire fraud and an unlawful monetary transaction. Van Dyke has pleaded not guilty. A federal judge has tentatively scheduled trial for Dec. 7, while Van Dyke’s attorneys have said they plan to seek dismissal of the indictment by July 31.
A dismissal in the CFTC lawsuit would not directly affect the criminal case, though a ruling that the Polymarket contracts were not swaps could give Van Dyke’s attorneys another argument against the criminal commodities charges.
If the judge dismisses the CFTC lawsuit because the Polymarket contracts were not swaps, the ruling would not settle the national fight over event contracts by itself. But an appeal could put the same swap-definition question before another federal appeals court, adding to a legal fight that is already moving toward a possible Supreme Court test through the state sports event contract cases.
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