Michigan House Bill 4938, the “Anticorruption of Public Morals Act,” was introduced on September 11, 2025 in the 103rd Michigan Legislature. As written, it would criminalize broad categories of online sexual content and require internet service providers to deploy content filters and to detect and block “circumvention tools,” explicitly including virtual private networks (VPNs), proxy servers, and encrypted tunneling methods. It would also ban the sale or promotion of such tools when used to access prohibited material.
This market asks whether some version of HB 4938 will be enacted into Michigan law by the end of the current 2025–2026 legislative term, with its core VPN / circumvention-tool ban still substantively in place.
Resolution criteria
Resolve YES if, on or before 11:59 pm Eastern time on December 31, 2026, all of the following are true:
A bill that is clearly derived from 2025 House Bill 4938 is enacted in Michigan (passed by both chambers and signed by the governor, or enacted over a veto) during the 2025–2026 legislative term.
The enacted law defines “circumvention tools” (or an equivalent concept) in a way that explicitly includes VPNs or “virtual private networks,” and:
either requires ISPs or other network operators to monitor for and block traffic using such tools,
or prohibits selling, promoting, or providing such tools for accessing the banned content.
No later amendment or accompanying carve-out in the same law neutralizes that restriction for general public use. For example, if the final law:
removes VPNs and similar tools from the “circumvention tools” definition, or
explicitly protects normal consumer and corporate VPN usage in a way that means ISPs are not required or allowed to generally block VPNs,
then the VPN ban is considered not intact and the market resolves NO.
If a narrower exemption is added (for example, a narrow carve-out only for some government or corporate networks) but the general ban on VPNs / circumvention tools for ordinary users remains, the VPN ban is considered intact and this condition is satisfied.
Resolve NO if any of the following happen by the resolution date:
HB 4938, or any successor vehicle carrying its main content, fails to pass both chambers or is vetoed and not overridden.
A related bill passes but omits VPNs / circumvention tools entirely, or reduces their treatment to something clearly weaker than the current “monitor and block” plus “ban sale or promotion” approach.
The bill dies at the end of the 2025–2026 term without enactment and is merely reintroduced in a later legislature under a new bill number.
If the situation is ambiguous (for example, conflicting interpretations of whether a carve-out truly guts the VPN ban), the market should resolve based on the plain text of the enacted statute and the most authoritative contemporary reporting (Michigan Legislature site, major Michigan or national outlets, or serious legal/tech analysis).
Timeframe / Close date
The 103rd Michigan Legislature runs through December 31, 2026, and bills from 2025 can carry over into the 2026 session.
I’d set the market close date to December 31, 2026, with resolution once it’s clear whether HB 4938 or a direct successor has been enacted and what the final text says.
Primary resolution sources
In order of priority:
Official Michigan Legislature pages for HB 4938 and any successor bills in the 2025–2026 term (bill history and final enrolled text).
The published text of the enacted law, if any, and any official session laws / public acts database.
Coverage from reputable outlets specifically discussing the VPN / circumvention-tool provisions in the final law (for example TechRadar, Proton’s public policy commentary, Reason, etc.).
If there’s a conflict between news summaries and the statutory text, the statutory text controls.
1,000Status update on HB 4938 (March 2026)
Six months after introduction, the bill remains parked in the House Judiciary Committee with no hearing scheduled. The structural obstacles to passage have only become clearer over time.
Legislative math: Michigan has divided government. Republicans hold the House 58-52, but Democrats control the Senate 19-18 (with a vacancy pending a May 5, 2026 special election) and Governor Whitmer is a Democrat. Even if the bill cleared the Republican House, the Democratic Senate would almost certainly kill it, and Whitmer would veto it if it somehow reached her desk. There is no path through both chambers on this.
Productivity context: The 2025 session was historically unproductive under divided government. Only 74 public acts were signed into law, an 81% drop from the 20-year average of 383 per year. Bipartisan dealmaking has been the only viable route for legislation, and a total porn ban with a VPN prohibition is not the kind of bill that attracts cross-party support.
Sponsor credibility: In October 2025, Metro Times reported that lead sponsor Josh Schriver’s personal email appeared in a data breach from Fling.com, a pornographic hookup site. Schriver denied it, but the reporting cited corroborating details across multiple breach databases. This has not helped the bill’s political viability. The bill has only six cosponsors, all Republicans from the chamber’s right flank.
Constitutional and technical viability: Legal commentators have been uniformly dismissive. Unlike the age-verification laws other states have passed (which at least have a plausible path under the current Supreme Court), HB 4938 is an outright content ban for all adults. It would collide head-on with Reno v. ACLU and decades of First Amendment precedent. On the technical side, the VPN blocking mandate is essentially unimplementable at the ISP level without breaking corporate remote-access infrastructure statewide.
The bill has no committee hearing, no bipartisan support, no viable path through a Democratic Senate, no gubernatorial support, massive constitutional exposure, and a lead sponsor whose credibility on the issue took a direct hit.
This resolves NO by expiration at year-end absent some dramatic change in Michigan’s political landscape.
If lawmakers are reading this my proposal: Until you’re 25, you should be able to view as much porn as you want but only at 2400 baud. Then, for each decade after, you can get a 1 Mbps upgrade. So at like 65 you’re at 5 Mbps, and I think that scales appropriately.