Ethereum co-creator Vitalik Buterin warned on Wednesday against voting for political candidates based solely on whether they have adopted an “over-crypto” stance.
“The game of politics is much more complicated than ‘who’s going to win the next election,’ and there are many levers that affect your words and actions.” Buterin wrote in a blog post This warned that even Putin and the Russian government had “expressed a willingness to become ‘open to encryption’.”
Buterin’s post comes as Donald Trump, who has positioned himself as the pro-cryptocurrency candidate for president, rallies members of his party at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee and a day after venture capitalists Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz told Andreessen employees Horowitz ( a16z ) that they plan to make significant donations to political action committees supporting Donald Trump’s campaign.
In an episode of “The Ben & Marc Show,” featuring the co-founders of a16z, Horowitz said that Joe Biden’s administration, in the form of the US Securities and Exchange Commission and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, has “fought” them every step of the way “using very nefarious means. “
“I think over 30 of our companies have been sued,” Horowitz added. “They lose almost all of these lawsuits, but the problem is that when you’re a startup you don’t have the money to fight the US government, so they’re nucleating the industry that way.”
Fairshake, a super PAC backed by leading crypto companies, is now one of the highest spending PACs this election cycle. Of the total $160 million in contributions it has raised, 94% can be traced to just four companies: Ripple, Andreesen Horowitz, Coinbase, and Jump Crypto.
“There is a particular style of being ‘crypto-friendly’ that is common to authoritarian governments that is worth watching out for. The best example of this is, predictably, modern Russia,” added Buterin, a Russian-born coder who built ethereum in its late teens.
Tesla chief Elon Musk and venture capitalist Peter Thiel, as well as crypto leaders such as Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss, have also endorsed Trump.
In early June in San Francisco, technologists, crypto executives and venture capitalists paid up to $300,000 per ticket to attend a Trump fundraiser that eventually raised more than $12 million.
“Specifically, by publicly giving the impression that you support ‘pro-crypto’ candidates just because they are ‘hyper-crypto,’ you help create an incentive gradient where politicians understand that all they need to get your support is for supporting ” encryption,” continued Buterin, who is known for periodically publishing lengthy opinionated essays on existential threats to the ecosystem.
Buterin did not single out any names in his place of either political candidates or those who chose to support them.
Trump – who launched his latest collection of non-fungible tokens on the solana blockchain in April – has been making increasingly bullish comments about cryptocurrencies.
It accepts digital currency donations and is committed to defending the rights of those who choose to hold their coins themselves, meaning they don’t rely on a central entity like Coinbase to hold their tokens and instead, do it themselves them with personal cryptographic wallets, which are sometimes beyond the reach of the Internal Revenue Service. Trump also promised at the Libertarian National Convention in Washington in May to keep Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and “her fans” away from bitcoin holders.
Meanwhile, after a meeting with bitcoiners at Mar-a-Lago with about a dozen mining executives who promised him cash and votes, Trump declared that all future bitcoin will be minted in the US if he returns to the White House.
On Monday, the Republican presidential candidate added Ohio Senator JD Vance to his ticket as his running mate — a move seen by many as a clear win for the cryptocurrency sector. Vance has advocated for looser regulation of crypto and revealed in 2022 that he personally owns bitcoin.
It stands in stark contrast to White House Joe Biden, who has been seen as tough on crypto. Under President Biden, the Securities and Exchange Commission has taken action in the sector, and even in the absence of strict rules from Congress, the US has proven to be one of the most active sanctions and legal enforcement agencies against crypto companies.
The angrier the crypto industry got at the SEC for arresting and prosecuting them, the more people like Vance saw an opportunity to play a position on the opposite side of a crypto-skeptic Biden administration.
However, the perception that Biden is anti-crypto and Trump is pro-crypto has some Biden allies concerned enough to make their case directly to senior White House officials.
Trump is set to headline the Bitcoin 2024 conference in Nashville, Tennessee on July 27.
