Reuters: Ex-SEC Enforcement Director "Clashed with Agency Leaders Over Direction of Enforcement Program"

US SEC’s ex-enforcement chief clashed with bosses over Trump cases before leaving, sources say

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s top enforcement official, who left abruptly last week, had clashed with agency leaders over the direction of its enforcement program, including the handling of cases with ties to President Donald Trump and his family, according to three people familiar with the matter.

SEC Enforcement Division Director Margaret Ryan resigned last Monday after just over six months on the job, Reuters was the first to report. Her resignation email, seen by Reuters, did not say why she was leaving. Ryan declined to comment when reached by phone and text.

Two of the people said Ryan wanted to be more aggressive in pursuing charges for fraud and other misconduct including in cases that touched the president’s circle, but faced resistance from SEC chair Paul Atkins and other top Republican political appointees.

A spokesperson for the SEC said that, under Atkins, the agency made enforcement decisions based on facts, the law, and policy, not on politics: “In every case, the Commission has faithfully applied the federal securities laws. Debate and discussion among our lawyers and other staff is common and encouraged.”

White House spokespeople did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

It Seemed Too Strange to Be True. Bypassed Staff, An Abrupt Resignation, A Dismantled Agency. Reuters Just Confirmed All of It.

Last week, I wrote two posts that, taken together, may have seemed far-fetched. In the first, I described SEC enforcement staff being sidelined in their own settlement discussions. In the second, I argued that something was deeply wrong at the SEC, that Margaret Ryan’s abrupt departure had the unmistakable smell of something rotten, and that the official explanation was fiction dressed up as a press release.

It all sounded implausible. It wasn’t.

Reuters has now confirmed what many of us suspected: Margaret Ryan didn’t just quietly resign. She clashed, repeatedly and directly, with Chair Atkins over cases with ties to President Trump, including Justin Sun and Elon Musk. She wanted to pursue fraud. She was told, in effect, not to.

A settlement is not a finding of truth

A settlement is not a finding of truth.
It is often a decision about risk, cost, and survival.

They write it.
You sign it.
You live with it.

I have lived that.

This week, alongside the New Civil Liberties Alliance, we filed a petition with the Supreme Court challenging that condition.

The question is simple:

Can the government require you to give up your voice as the price of resolving a case, even when they control the language and you are never allowed to challenge it?

Polymarket Updates Insider Trading Rules Following Scrutiny Over Manipulation

Polymarket and Kalshi have taken steps to squash some types of insider trading as the prediction market platforms have come under increasing scrutiny for suspected manipulation.

Polymarket updated its rules on Monday to clarify that certain kinds of bets are prohibited: users cannot act on stolen confidential information, wager using illegal tips, or bet if they are in a position to influence the outcome of an event. […]

Hours later, Polymarket’s main rival Kalshi said in a blog post that it was taking additional steps to prevent insider trading on sports and political events. It will now screen for and block politicians wagering on their own campaigns and athletes making bets related to the sports they play.

Both companies are focusing on types of trading that would generally be prohibited from other regulated markets. But prediction markets have developed faster than the rules governing them.