Ahead of Trump Crypto Fundraiser, Warren Questions Government Ethics Agency on Crypto Czar David Sacks Conflicts of Interest
Monday’s $1.5 million-a-head fundraiser comes ahead of Senate vote on GENIUS Act, legislation that would further greenlight the President’s crypto grift
“Mr. Sacks is financially invested in the crypto industry, positioning him to potentially profit from the crypto policy changes he makes at the White House”
Washington, D.C. – U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), ranking member of the Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee, wrote to the United States Office of Government Ethics (OGE), questioning a White House ethics waiver allowing David Sacks—President Trump’s “Crypto Czar”—to shape federal crypto policy while holding personal financial stakes in the industry.
“Tonight, Mr. Sacks is co-hosting a $1.5 million-a-head dinner for crypto industry players to raise money for a Trump-aligned super PAC,” wrote Ranking Member Warren. “Meanwhile, Mr. Sacks is financially invested in the crypto industry, positioning him to potentially profit from the crypto policy changes he makes at the White House.”
Sacks is reportedly spending half his time advising the president on crypto policy and the other half managing his venture capital firm, which continues to hold investments in the digital asset industry. Under federal ethics law, such clear conflicts of interest would typically bar him from participating in crypto policymaking. But the Trump White House issued an ethics waiver—overriding those safeguards and allowing Sacks to shape policy that could directly benefit his portfolio.
“Mr. Sacks simultaneously leads a firm invested in crypto while guiding the nation’s crypto policy,” wrote Ranking Member Warren. “Normally, federal law would prohibit such an explicit conflict of interest.”
The White House waiver confirms that Sacks’s decisions could affect the value of his investments, but claims the financial stakes are “not so substantial” as to compromise his integrity. The public has no way to verify that claim because Mr. Sacks’s financial disclosure form has not been made public. In the letter, Senator Warren calls on OGE to confirm whether it reviewed or approved Sacks’s waiver and whether he continues to hold financial interests that pose a conflict with his policymaking role. She also calls on OGE to make his financial disclosures public in light of heightened interest.
“The public should know that every policymaker shaping digital asset legislation is acting solely in the national interest, free from personal financial motivations,” Ranking Member Warren continued. “In the interest of the ‘(t)ransparent’ regulation of the crypto industry, as the White House claims to support, I ask that OGE provide the public with the following information to better understand the waiver and Mr. Sacks’s potential conflicts of interest…”
Senator Warren’s letter and Sacks’s crypto fundraiser come just days before the Senate is expected to vote on the GENIUS Act, legislation that would create a framework for regulating stablecoins, a type of cryptocurrency whose value is pegged to the value of another asset, like the U.S. dollar. President Trump’s open efforts to profit from stablecoins since the Committee markup—and the obvious opportunities for bribery and other influence peddling—have made it difficult for original supporters of the bill to stand by the legislation. Ranking Member Warren has made clear that if the GENIUS Act goes forward without changes, Donald Trump will continue to line his pockets with his crypto scams while he tanks the economy for the rest of us.
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