Tyler Winklevoss and Cameron Winklevoss (left), founders of cryptocurrency exchange Gemini Trust Co., on stage at Bitcoin 2021, a cryptocurrency conference held at the Mana Convention Center in Wynwood in Miami, Florida, on June 4, 2021.
Joe Rydell | Getty Images
Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss are the largest individual crypto donors this election cycle, giving a total of $10.1 million, or just over $5 million each, according to Federal Election Commission data compiled by crypto and blockchain market analyst James Dilmore and independently verified by CNBC.
With 50 days to go until the November general election, political donations from or in support of the cryptocurrency industry have reached nearly $190 million, as some of the biggest names in the sector open their digital wallets to help elect candidates sympathetic to their interests.
The Winklevoss twins have donated about $1.7 million combined. Bitcoin To the Trump 47 Committee, which raises money for former Republican President Donald Trump, more than $700,000 combined to the pro-Trump Make America Great Again PAC, $250,000 each to the pro-Trump America PAC, and $4.9 million to the pro-crypto Fairshake PAC.
Top executives from blockchain giant Ripple Labs have donated more than $3 million to candidate committees and super PACs so far this cycle, with co-founder Chris Larsen donating nearly $2.4 million of that, mostly to help Democratic candidates. Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse has donated more than $384,000 to several super PACs and candidates, including Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) and John Dayton, a Republican running against Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren in Massachusetts. The company’s chief legal officer, Stuart Aldroti, has donated $300,000 to Trump 47.
At a fundraiser for Trump in June, Alderotti explained how Ripple has spent more than $100 million in litigation to defend itself against civil charges brought by the Securities and Exchange Commission. The event was held at the San Francisco mansion of businessman David Sachs.
The Winklevoss twins and Coinbase did not respond to requests for comment. Ripple referred CNBC to previous comments from executives, including a June post from Garlinghouse on X, in which he wrote that “candidates will only gain votes by being pro-crypto, and will almost certainly lose votes by being anti-crypto.”
In the month after the San Francisco fundraiser, Trump promised to fire SEC Chairman Gary Gensler if elected, even though U.S. presidents do not have the power to fire independent commission members without cause. While the next president could remove Gensler from his position as chairman, he would remain a commissioner for the rest of his term.
Under Gensler's leadership, the SEC has taken on major players in the industry, including centralized cryptocurrency exchanges Kraken and Coinbase.
Executives at both companies have spent huge sums during this cycle. Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong has donated more than $1.3 million to a range of political action committees including Fairshake and J.D. Vance for Senate Inc., as well as direct donations to Democrats and Republicans running for House and Senate seats. Chief legal officer Paul Grewal has also attended at least two Trump fundraising events, including one in Nashville on the sidelines of the biggest bitcoin event of the year.
Jesse Powell, co-founder and chairman of Kraken, donated just over $1 million to Trump's campaign.
Individual crypto contributors include former Bitfinex chief strategy officer Phil Potter ($1.6 million+), Multicoin Capital’s Kyle Samani ($878,600), Paradigm co-founder Fred Ehrsam ($735,400), Union Square Ventures partner Fred Wilson ($1.4 million), Paxos CEO and co-founder Charles Cascarilla ($198,500), BitGo CEO Mike Belshe ($119,825), Solana co-founder Anatoly Yakvinko ($67,100), and Gibraltar-based Xapo Bank founder Wences Casares ($374,899).
According to Delmore’s report, no known cryptocurrency donations have been made to Future Forward PAC, which is raising money for Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential candidate. Future Forward began accepting cryptocurrency donations this month through a partnership with Coinbase Commerce. The donations page on the site still doesn’t appear to offer a cryptocurrency option.
CNBC reached out to two Future Forward representatives listed on its PAC filing with the Federal Election Commission to ask about total crypto donations to date and when it plans to add a crypto payment option to its website. They did not immediately respond.
Harris' fundraising has taken off since President Biden dropped out of the race, with her campaign raising $47 million in the first 24 hours after her first, and possibly only, debate against Trump on Tuesday.
Huge leap from 2020
Delmore, who compiles reports on crypto donations in the 2024 election for blockchain analytics platform Breadcrumbs, told CNBC that the industry’s spending has nearly doubled from what it was in the midterms — more than $190 million in the 2024 election versus $98 million in the 2022 election. That’s nearly 13 times the $15 million spent in 2020 — a figure based on a combination of data from Federal Election Commission filings and OpenSecrets.
Unlike the past two elections, which featured spending from the bankrupt cryptocurrency exchange FTX and its founder Sam Bankman-Fried, this year’s list of contributors is more robust and diverse. Bankman-Fried was sentenced to 25 years in prison in March for stealing $8 billion in customer funds through FTX.
“Most of the crypto donations in 2022 were from FTX and SBF, and almost all of them went to Democrats or PACs that support Democrats,” Delmore said.
Spending was more balanced between the parties, Delmore said, but “more certainly went to Republican candidates and political action committees that supported Republicans and opposed Democrats.”
A report by Public Citizen last month found that nearly half of the money flowing into this year’s election came from the cryptocurrency industry, with Coinbase and Ripple leading the way.
There is a lot of overlap between the largest companies and individuals spending on cryptocurrencies.
The majority of the money allocated to Fairshake, one of the highest-spending political action committees this year, can be traced back to four sources: Coinbase, Ripple, Jump Crypto, and venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz.
Expanding the category to include all cryptocurrencies, Delmore’s research found that billions of dollars are at stake, including more than $20 million in sales generated by non-fungible tokens (NFTs) issued by Trump, according to Bloomberg, and Trump-branded meme tokens, $190 million in political donations from or in support of cryptocurrencies, and another $1.1 billion in betting on the Polymarket platform.
So far, $922 million in bets have been placed on who will win the election, and another $206 million on who will win the popular vote.
The election of crypto-friendly candidates ultimately depends on how well people vote.
Coinbase launched the Stand With Crypto Alliance last year, and it’s now in the midst of a bus tour across swing states to urge people to register to vote. The campaign culminates with an event in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday that will feature speeches from senior Coinbase executives, as well as a live performance by music duo The Chainsmokers.
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