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- Donald Trump just embraced crypto.
- His new comments comes as the US is gearing up for an election.
- Industry stakeholders expect crypto to be deciding issue in the vote.
Donald Trump just cemented crypto as an election issue.
The former US president embraced the industry on Wednesday during at a dinner at his Mar-a-Lago resort for holders of his different NFT collections.
“I’m fine with it,” Trump said in a clip widely shared on X. “I want to make sure it’s good and solid, but I’m good with it. If you like crypto in any form — it comes in a lot of different forms — if you’re in favour of crypto you’d better vote for Trump.”
The comments excited the crypto community, who rallied behind him on social media platforms.
“If we’re going to embrace it we have to let them be here,” he said in response to a question about crypto firms leaving the US.
Trump said US crypto firms are leaving because of what he called “hostility” from Democrats and Securities and Exchange Commission Chair Gary Gensler.
The comments also mark a shift in Trump’s crypto stance after he dismissed Bitcoin as “a scam against the dollar” in 2021.
While crypto has so far been seen as a marginal election issue, industry reps — including crypto exchange Coinbase’s legal head Paul Grewal — have said that the issue will be a big factor in the outcome of the election.
A shift
Trump has been moving closer to the community by launching a string of NFT collections, and agreeing with lawmakers from both political parties that a US digital dollar — or CBDC — would be a threat to Americans’ civil liberties.
He also juxtaposed his stance against that of President Joe Biden, who Trump said doesn’t even know what crypto is.
The comments came on the same day that Biden said he’d veto a resolution seeking to repeal a Securities and Exchange Commission accounting policy.
The SEC policy — named Staff Accounting Bulletin No 121, or SAB 121 — puts makes it costlier for financial institutions custodying digital assets.
Biden has previously introduced a controversial tax proposal, which would subject Bitcoin miners to a 30% excise tax on their electricity costs.
While mainstream cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum were down over the past 24 hours, the Jeo Boden memecoin that makes fun of Biden jumped by 21.5% on the back of Trump’s comments.
Eric Johansson is DL News’ News Editor. Got a tip? Reach out on eric@dlnews.com.