Key points:

  • Donald Trump is chairing one of the biggest crypto conferences, Bitcoin 2024.
  • Cryptocurrency’s influence on politics is growing; the Fairshake Committee spent over $10 million against Katie Porter, who raised concerns about the environmental impact of Bitcoin mining.
  • Cryptocurrency ownership among Americans has fallen, but interest in the industry remains high, especially among politicians.

Republican candidate and former US President Donald Trump, who previously criticized cryptocurrency in 2021 as a “fraud,” is now headlining one of the industry’s largest conferences. He will now speak on Saturday, July 27, the final day of the three-day Bitcoin 2024 event in Nashville.

Other speakers will include independent US presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr., former Republican candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, Tennessee Senator Bill Hagerty, and Wyoming Senator Cynthia Lummis.

Cryptocurrency’s influence on politics is growing

A political action committee called Fairshake, which supports pro-cryptocurrency candidates, spent more than $10 million this year against progressive California Democrat Katie Porter, who was running for Senate. Porter, who has expressed concerns about the impact of Bitcoin mining on climate change, lost in the primary.

Some cryptocurrency supporters, including the billionaire Winklevoss twins, founders of the crypto company Gemini, support Trump. They each donated $1 million in Bitcoin to him, but were forced to return the funds because the amount exceeded federal limits.

Crypto enthusiasts are unhappy with democrats

According to data released by the Federal Reserve in May, 7% of American adults owned or used cryptocurrency in 2023, down 3 percentage points from 2022 and 5 percentage points from 2021.

Still, the annual convention is attracting more politicians. Trump’s presence at the Bitcoin 2024 event is his latest gesture of support for the industry. At a fundraiser in San Francisco in June, he criticized Democrats’ attempts to regulate the space. Trump also met with bitcoin mining companies at his Mar-a-Lago resort last month and expressed his desire to see more U.S. firms mining bitcoin.

Moreover, cryptocurrency executives are disappointed with the actions of the Securities and Exchange Commission under the Biden administration. The agency claims that crypto companies like Coinbase and Binance offer trading in digital assets on their platforms that should have been registered as securities, which the companies deny. The White House said the Biden-Harris administration will continue to consult with stakeholders and work with Congress to develop the necessary safeguards to take advantage of the potential benefits and opportunities that innovation in crypto assets presents.

Cameron Dawson, chief investment officer at NewEdge Wealth, noted that cryptocurrency and Bitcoin in particular are “the purest and most direct way to invest in support of Trump at this point.”