Gambling site Bookmaker took quite a punch last night after losing $276,424 to people who correctly bet that Trump would make at least 3.5 “false statements” (aka lies, or alternative facts) during his Oval Office address last night – in fact, 92% of the people who placed a bet got it right.
“Bookmaker.eu asked people to wager on the president’s truthfulness, offering odds of -145 for more than 3.5 lies and +115 for less than 3.5 lies. That means if a person bet $145 dollars that Trump would lie at least four times, they would win $100,” according to BuzzFeed. Bookmaker used The Washington Post’s Fact Checker to determine which Trump statements were falsehoods.
The big question is, why would a gambling site offer such a stupid bet in the first place? Apparently, they were banking on the fact that Trump wouldn’t be able to squeeze in enough lies in the short 8-minute time allotment he had. Huge miscalculation – we’re talking about Trump, after all.
Via BuzzFeed:
The site used the Washington Post’s Fact Checker as the arbiter of Trump’s truth and lies. The Post’s live blog has corrected six statements that Trump made during the televised address seeking a border wall. (Here’s the reality of what’s going on at the border.)
Lester said Bookmaker expected Trump to lie, but that it had also factored in the time constraints the president would be under in delivering Tuesday’s speech.
“We figured the president’s strategy going in would be a bit of fear mongering to create pressure on the Democrats to approve the funding of the wall (or barrier), however the president was also constrained by an approximate 8-minute time limit,” Lester said. “With all the cable networks agreeing to air the speech, it came down to, how many times is the president willing to exaggerate the truth to accomplish his agenda, when he knows the world will be scrutinizing his every word?”
The biggest winners won $25,000, 20,000, and 15,000. Like taking candy from a baby.
Image: Gage Skidmore/Flickr