Trump, Cryptocurrency, and the Real Winners and Losers
NEWS | 18 May 2025
Lauren Goode: I mean us, the American people. There is just almost nothing about this that benefits the people of the United States. I feel like if we could all just take a step back for a moment in this year, and by we, I mean the American people, and remind ourselves that our public servants are supposed to be serving the American people. They're supposed to be providing opportunities for the people of the country to live a better life. They're supposed to facilitate a fair market and stable economy. Katie, your favorite word, stable. Katie Drummond: I do like a stable economy. Lauren Goode: Which as of April has not been the case, supposed to offer protections and support in terms of public health, which as we discussed last week on the podcast, has not been the case. They're supposed to carry out priorities in the interest of national security. If they would only stop using unauthorized Signal chats to do that, they're not supposed to be running a crypto grift or any grift that benefits them this richly. You could maybe, maybe argue that having a tech-forward administration committed to seriously evaluating the role of cryptocurrency in modern society is a good thing, but that's not what this is. This to me feels like a scheme. Michael Calore: And it's difficult to pin actual tangible harm on people because if you look at some of the things that the Trump administration has been doing with regards to trimming back government spending, they're cutting programs that cut access to people and then you can actually trace that they actively cause harm. They're denying people specific benefits that help them stay alive, help them stay in their homes, et cetera. With this, it's like, "Yeah, who's it really hurting?" Well, it's hurting our whole notion of how government is supposed to work and how international relations are supposed to work, how access to powerful people in our government is supposed to work. It's breaking my mind. Lauren Goode: There's a famous Alexander Hamilton quote, which I'm not going to get right at the moment, but is basically that one of the greatest threats that you have to the republic is the idea that a foreign adversary could buy its way in. Michael Calore: So, beyond the TrumpCoin frenzy, there has also been increasing reporting and scrutiny surrounding the recent business deals led by Donald Trump's two oldest sons, Eric and Donald Trump Jr. Let's run through those business deals. Katie Drummond: Boy, there's a lot to cover here. So, let's start with stablecoin business. So, last week, Eric Trump showed up on stage. He was in Dubai. He showed up at a crypto conference, Token 2049, and he was with the cofounder of World Liberty Financial. He was with the son of the White House envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, where they announced the USD1 crypto stablecoin. Now, it's important to note here that the Trump family holds a 60 percent stake in World Liberty Financial. So, basically by transacting in this stablecoin USD1, entities who are affiliated with foreign powers, essentially foreign actors could indirectly transfer wealth, transfer money to the Trump family, and essentially buy their way in to access, again, similar to the dinner we were just talking about, buy access to the president of the United States. Now, it doesn't stop there. There was a New York Times story published earlier this week that literally, like I was reading the story, I was in a cab, my jaw was on the floor of the taxi through the entire story. So, the story was about Don Jr. and Eric, and let me read you just a little bit of it. This story touched on all of the different business exploits that these boys have going on all around the world, particularly in the Middle East. So, "a luxury hotel in Dubai, a second high-end residential tower in Saudi Arabia, two cryptocurrency ventures based in the United States, a new golf course and villa complex in Qatar, and a new private club in Washington." So those are just a few of the deals that Eric and Don Jr. are brokering all over the world, all on behalf of the Trump Foundation, which Eric runs. Now, some of these ventures, it's important to note, also involve foreign governments. So, including the government of Qatar, government of the UAE, it's a mess. I mean, these guys are everywhere all at once. They are doing a lot of business deals, leveraging the Trump name for sure, leveraging the fact that their dad is in office, but the complexity here is that all of this money funnels into the Trump Foundation, which will directly benefit Donald Trump himself. So, it's not out of the ordinary. It's not crazy for the offspring or the family members of a sitting president to essentially cash in on that status. It's a little icky, but it happens all the time. It's very conventional, at least in US politics. What is particularly unique about this situation is that the president himself also stands to gain financially from the ventures that his sons are undertaking. That is the key distinction here.
Author: Leah Feiger. Lauren Goode. Michael Calore. Katie Drummond. Zoë Schiffer. Paige Oamek. Anna Lagos. Steven Levy. Vittoria Elliott. Kate Knibbs.
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