POLITICO Nightly: Crypto becomes a DC powerhouse

By Calder McHugh Presented by  A woman walks past signs advertising cryptocurrency banking at Union Station in Washington, D.C. on March 16, 2023. | Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP via Getty Images BULL MARKET — There’s a new sheriff in town. The cryptocurrency industry, once a sideshow better known for its scams than its political clout, spent and won big on congressional races this year, establishing itself as a formidable interest group in the nation’s capital. Pro-cryptocurrency super PACs — organized together in a network called Fairshake — poured over $130 million into the 2024 election cycle . And all of their significant bets paid off. In the Ohio Senate race, they spent $40 million for Republican Bernie Moreno in his fight to unseat Sherrod Brown, the Senate Banking chair who voted against pro-crypto legislation and supported fellow Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren in her push to hold hearings on whether digital coins were tied to terrorism. In addition to greasing Moreno’s path to the Senate, crypto super PACs plowed $10 million each into the campaigns of pro-crypto Democrats Elissa Slotkin and Ruben Gallego, who captured Senate seats this month in Michigan and Arizona, respectively. But Fairshake was successful in shaping outcomes long before Election Day. Earlier in the year, in California’s Democratic Senate primary, the network spent $10 million to defeat Warren ally Rep. Katie Porter. The group also spent in primary contests to take down Democratic Reps. Jamaal Bowman and Cori Bush, members of the progressive “Squad” who were supported by Warren and were no friends to the crypto industry. At the White House, digital currency also has a stalwart ally. After early skepticism, President-elect Donald Trump himself is now a strong backer. He accepted donations to his campaign through cryptocurrency and in September unveiled his own crypto project along with his sons Eric and Don Jr. called World Liberty Financial. On Monday, Trump met with Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong, whose company poured money into the Fairshake super PACs. The Financial Times reported earlier this week that Trump’s media company, which runs Truth Social, is in advanced talks to buy the crypto trading firm Bakkt. Trump has already pledged to fire Gary Gensler , the chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission, on day one. Perhaps crypto’s chief antagonist in Washington, Gensler’s efforts to police the digital currency — which is not controlled by a central authority and is instead traded through crypto exchanges such as Coinbase — has led to $400 million in legal defense costs alone . The rise of this new power in Washington might have seemed unlikely just a few short years ago. Sam Bankman-Fried, the founder of leading cryptocurrency exchange FTX and the most prominent crypto advocate in D.C., was convicted and sentenced to 25 years in prison for stealing $8 billion from customers. After the spectacular collapse of FTX in 2022, many members of Congress began to get aggressive on the issue of crypto oversight . But as time passed and the crypto cash began flowing again, crypto bulls began to come back into vogue in Washington. Congress began to support legislation championed by the crypto industry. Anti-crypto lawmakers ultimately found little broad-based support for any substantive congressional oversight on the industry. Now, in the wake of this year’s elections, the crypto industry has established a beachhead in both parties. While there is still a sizable contingent of anti-crypto lawmakers, a post-election analysis from the industry group Stand With Crypto reports that the House elected 275 pro-crypto lawmakers, compared to just 122 who are characterized as anti-crypto. In the Senate, the group reports that 20 pro-crypto candidates were elected this year, compared to just 12 opponents. The industry isn’t done burnishing its reputation as a political force to be reckoned with: Fairshake announced in early November that it had already raised $78 million for the 2026 elections. And it remains an industry with room to grow even further. Only 17 percent of U.S. adults have ever invested, traded or used cryptocurrency . Welcome to POLITICO Nightly. Reach out with news, tips and ideas at nightly@politico.com . Or contact tonight’s author at cmchugh@politico.com or on X (formerly known as Twitter) at @calder_mchugh .   A message from AARP: America’s 48 million family caregivers spend over $7,000 a year to care for older parents, spouses and other loved ones. They need a tax credit. With a new Congress, it’s time to act on the Credit for Caring tax credit.   What'd I Miss? — Former Georgia election workers ask judge to hold Rudy Giuliani in contempt: Two former Georgia election workers are asking a federal judge to hold Rudy Giuliani in contempt of court for repeating false claims that have already led to a $148 million defamation judgment against him. Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss say Giuliani repeated baseless claims on an episode of his podcast last week, saying that they counted fraudulent ballots in the 2020 election. The conflict is now in the hands of U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell, who presided over Giuliani’s defamation trial last year and found him liable for the massive payout. MAGA MORONS' BATHROOM LUNACY! — Speaker announces policy barring transgender women from women’s bathrooms on House side of Capitol: Speaker Mike Johnson has banned transgender women from using women’s bathrooms in the House portion of the Capitol building , enacting into policy a push led by Rep. Nancy Mace. “All single-sex facilities in the Capitol and House Office Buildings — such as restrooms, changing rooms, and locker rooms — are reserved for individuals of that biological sex,” Johnson said in a statement today. — Man convicted of killing Laken Riley sentenced to life in prison without parole: The Venezuelan man convicted in the killing of Georgia nursing student Laken Riley has been sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole . Jose Ibarra was charged with murder and other crimes in Riley’s February death, and the guilty verdict was reached today by Athens-Clarke County Superior Court Judge H. Patrick Haggard. Ibarra, 26, had waived his right to a jury trial, meaning Haggard alone heard and decided the case.   Want to know what's really happening with Congress's make-or-break spending fights? Get daily insider analysis of Hill negotiations, funding deadlines, and breaking developments —free in your inbox with Inside Congress. Subscribe now .     THE NEXT ADMINISTRATION STILL SHELVED — The House Ethics Committee today did not agree to release the long-anticipated report into Matt Gaetz. “There was not an agreement by the committee to release the report,” Chair Michael Guest (R-Miss.) told reporters after the meeting ended. Other members declined to comment. Gaetz abruptly resigned from Congress last week, hours after President-elect Donald Trump tapped him to be attorney general. The Florida firebrand told GOP leadership the abrupt resignation was meant to allow them to fill his seat more quickly, but several Republicans theorized it was actually to avoid the coming release of the Ethics Committee report. Typically, once a member resigns they are no longer considered under the panel’s jurisdiction, though the Ethics Committee has released reports on former members at least twice before. DOGE PLANS — Civil service protections can’t stop large-scale firings of federal workers, the leaders of President-elect Donald Trump’s effort to downsize the government wrote today in an op-ed. Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, the co-leaders of Trump’s planned effort to cut federal rules and workers, authored a Wall Street Journal op-ed offering the most comprehensive plan sketched out so far for the new Trump endeavor. They plan to serve as “outside volunteers” and will work with the Trump transition team to “identify and hire a lean team of small-government crusaders,” they wrote. The new team will work “in the new administration” closely with the White House Office of Management and Budget, the authors wrote. NEXT AT NATO — President-elect Donald Trump announced today he will name former acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker, a close ally, to serve as the U.S. ambassador to NATO . Whitaker’s foreign policy views are largely unknown. A college football player turned prosecutor, Whitaker served as U.S. attorney for the southern district of Iowa and worked as a commentator before joining the Justice Department in 2017 as Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ chief of staff. Whitaker was seen as a contender for attorney general or another top law enforcement job in a second Trump administration. He has never served in a foreign policy or national security-focused role.   A message from AARP:   AROUND THE WORLD Demonstrators hold a Lebanese flag and a candle as they take part to a demonstration in support of the Palestinian people in London on Nov. 2, 2024. | Alberto Pezzali/AP TRUCE ‘WITHIN OUR GRASP’ — A United States envoy said an agreement to end the Israel-Hezbollah war is “within our grasp” after talks in Lebanon on Tuesday. However, there was no such optimism in the Gaza Strip, where the looting of nearly 100 aid trucks by armed men worsened an already severe food crisis. Amos Hochstein, the Biden administration’s pointman on Israel and Lebanon, arrived as Hezbollah’s allies in the Lebanese government said the militant group had responded positively to the proposal, which would entail both its fighters and Israeli ground forces withdrawing from a U.N. buffer zone in southern Lebanon. The buffer zone would be policed by thousands of additional U.N. peacekeepers and Lebanese troops. Israel has called for a stronger enforcement mechanism, potentially including the ability to conduct military operations against any Hezbollah threats, something Lebanon is likely to oppose. STEPPING ON IT — Human rights groups are fiercely criticizing President Joe Biden’s decision to give Ukraine anti-personnel land mines as it fights off a Russian invasion. The decision reverses a pledge Biden made to limit the use of such land mines in 2022. It comes as Biden prepares to leave office and reflects mounting U.S. concerns over Russia’s battlefield gains in eastern Ukraine. But although the type of land mine the Biden team is handing to Ukraine has certain safeguards, rights groups nonetheless warned that the weapons pose special and long-term dangers. “Anti-personnel land mines are indiscriminate weapons that kill and maim civilians, and especially children, for generations after wars end,” said Hichem Khadhraoui, executive director of the Center for Civilians in Conflict advocacy group. “These weapons cannot distinguish between civilians and combatants as required by international humanitarian law.”   Don't just read headline s—guide your organization's next move. POLITICO Pro's comprehensive Data Analysis tracks power shifts in Congress, ballot measures, and committee turnovers, giving you the deep context behind every policy decision. Learn more about what POLITICO Pro can do for you .     Nightly Number $25 billion The amount of money in pending loans that the Department of Energy is racing to close, directed to businesses building major clean energy projects across the country . The push is one of Biden’s last chances to cement his climate legacy before President-elect Donald Trump takes office next year. RADAR SWEEP 100 YEARS, 25 RECIPES — American cooking has been completely transformed over the last 100 years. It’s gone through fits and starts, seen trends go in and out of style and remains in a place of constant evolution. At Slate, writers Dan Kois and J. Bryan Lowder just underwent an ambitious task: Identifying the 25 most important recipes of the last century. From the Caesar Salad (1924) to the Zucchini Quiche (1972) to Logan Moffitt’s cucumbers (2024), they made a wide-ranging list. Read it here, and then decide what you might change — or what you might cook this week . Parting Image On this date in 1993: Then-President Bill Clinton greets saxophonist Clarence Clemons after Clemons played during the President’s arrival on stage at the Fairmont Hotel in San Francisco. | Susan Ragan/AP Did someone forward this email to you?  Sign up here .   A message from AARP: America needs family caregivers. And they need a tax credit. Family caregivers struggle to balance the demands of their jobs with caring for their older parents, spouses and other loved ones, leading too many to quit or reduce their hours at work. Added to that stress, family caregivers spend over $7,000 a year on out-of-pocket expenses to provide this care. They can’t afford it. And we can’t afford to ignore them. Family caregivers cover the costs to help older loved ones with: Transportation Adult day care Home modifications Home care aides Respite care And MUCH more. That’s why AARP is calling on the new Congress to act on the Credit for Caring tax credit--so America’s family caregivers can get some financial relief.     Follow us on Twitter Charlie Mahtesian @PoliticoCharlie Calder McHugh @calder_mchugh   Follow us

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