Comment by notepad0x90

did anyone have any reason to believe that was classified information that was leaked, instead of just a random person speculating? if not, then he had no intent to leak that information. If a random soldier told you, "iran will be nuked tomorrow" do you believe them? especially on a speculation platform, for all you know he's also guessing based on the same activites and events the public is observing. laws are all about intent and state of mind, what actually happened is irrelevant, what was intended is what matters. For example, killing a person is not a crime in and of itself, if it was all soldiers who kill someone in combat would be in prison, as would people who kill in self-defense. Matter of fact, if no classified information was actually leaked, but it could be proved that he intended to do something to leak classified info (which requires others to believe it is truthful information, instead of speculation) then that in itself is a crime.

Saying anything at all on a speculation platform, especially if others don't even know your identity (or you have no reason to believe they do), can only be treated as speculative intent, not intent to disclose classified information.

Yes, it seems in this case an adversary who was paying attention could have learned something very, very valuable.

> "A military operation is being planned" is very different from "Maduro will be kidnapped in the next x hours".

IIRC, the bet was on "Nicolas Maduro out?":

> If Nicolás Maduro leaves office before February 1, 2026, then the market resolves to Yes.

So the bet wasn't specifically "Nicolas Maduro kidnapped?" or even "Nicolas Maduro out by January 3rd?" And IIRC there was a lot of Trump saber rattling about Venezuela in the days before, hence the creation of the bet. I could absolutely see a plausible way to link these publicly-available pieces of information into a winning bet:

* Trump talking tough about Venezuela

* Spike in DC pizza activity on January 2nd