- President Trump said he didn't know who CZ was.
- The President issued a pardon to the founder of Binance on October 23.
- Changpeng Zhao's legal team took a swipe at Senator Elizabeth Warren.
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With more than 1,600 pardons issued in the first 10 months of his presidency, US President Donald Trump appears to be losing track of his acts of executive clemency.
That includes absolving Changpeng Zhao, the controversial founder of crypto exchange Binance, of his criminal record.
At least that’s according to a 60 Minutes interview that aired over the weekend.
Zhao, also known as CZ, pleaded guilty to violating US banking laws in 2023 and served four months in prison.
During his time as the exchange’s CEO, Binance failed to prevent criminals, sanctioned entities, and other bad actors from laundering billions of dollars in dirty money — including terrorist organisations such as Hamas.
So, why pardon him?
“Are you ready for it?” Trump said. “I don’t know who he is.”
Trump family
The ties between the Trump family and Binance have grown stronger over the last year.
Binance engineers helped design the infrastructure underpinning World Liberty Financial’s stablecoin, USD1, sources familiar with the matter told the Wall Street Journal. Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr. are co-founders of World Liberty Financial. The president is a co-founder emeritus of the project.
Additionally, when a UAE-based fund, MGX, invested $2 billion in Binance, they invested using USD1.
Since the pardon on October 23, a caucus of Democrat senators, including Maxine Waters, Christopher Murphy, and Bernie Sanders, has highlighted these ties.
“CZ pleaded guilty to a criminal money laundering charge and was sentenced to prison,” wrote Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren on October 23.
“Then he financed President Trump’s stablecoin and lobbied for a pardon. Today, he got it.”
Sabre-rattling
Warren’s comment appeared to get the most attention.
BakerHostetler, a law firm representing Zhao, sent Senator Warren a request to remove the tweet.
“Your statements are categorically false, misleading, and inflammatory to my client,” the letter seen by DL News reads. “Accordingly, we request immediate retraction.
Teresa Goody Guillén, a partner at BakerHostetler, told DL News they have not formally filed a lawsuit. Senator Warren’s attorney Ben Stafford responded on Sunday.
“Simply put, any threatened defamation claim would be without merit,” the letter read.
More than 10 days after tweeting, Senator Warren’s post is still online.
For now.
Liam Kelly is DL News’ Berlin-based DeFi correspondent. Have a tip? Get in touch at liam@dlnews.com.