The New York Post’s editorial board is calling on federal agents to investigate a pattern of suspiciously timed bets and trades tied to Operation Epic Fury — and is warning the White House that the appearance of insider trading could haunt President Donald Trump politically if it isn’t stopped.
The Post pointed to several specific examples raising red flags.
More than 150 Polymarket accounts placed hundreds of bets predicting a U.S. strike on Iran by the next day — just before the first strike happened. On March 23, nearly $600 million in oil futures trades were placed about 15 minutes before Trump announced he would not strike Iran’s power plants, with no public explanation for the spike.
And in January, a brand-new Polymarket account placed a $30,000 bet on the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro the day before it happened — walking away with more than $400,000.
The traders behind these transactions are anonymous to the public. But the Post noted that regulators like the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission have the power to identify them and investigate if the suspected foul play.
The Trump administration has warned White House staff against using confidential information for personal financial gain. But the Post argued that’s not enough.
The editorial also noted that Donald Trump Jr.’s firm, 1789 Capital, is a major investor in Polymarket — where some of the suspicious transactions took place. The Post was careful to say that this doesn’t actually imply any wrongdoing, but instead that Democrats won’t hesitate to weaponize it against the administration.
“Even the slightest possibility that people linked to the administration are profiteering off the war will leave folks wondering, stripping him of credibility on that and other issues,” the Post warned.
The board called directly on Trump to urge the SEC, the CFTC, or both to open investigations.
“If the public is left wondering,” the Post warned, “it may well come back to haunt the president — and Republicans more broadly.”