It is called Bitcoin-Politicians: it is the platform created by Jameson Lopp to check which politicians in the US Congress own bitcoin. At the moment, there are only two.
The Bitcoin-Politicians platform
Jameson Lopp, a developer and long-time BTC enthusiast, wanted to create Bitcoin-Politicians to bring more transparency to US politics. The platform lists current members of Congress one by one, divided by party, state, branch of Congress, and year of declaration consulted.
The site only has partial data at the moment. Jameson Lopp estimates that it would take at least 40 hours of work to finish scanning all the tax returns of members of Congress. It is a job that is done manually because, he explained, many documents are scanned from paper and are not in digital format. Therefore, APIs built to intercept this data automatically do not work either.
US politicians who own Bitcoin
Scrolling down the list, partial data reveals that only two members of Congress own bitcoin. Their names are not surprising:
- Cynthia Lummis, with an estimated wealth of between $100,000 and $250,000 in BTC;
- Patrick Toomey, who owns shares in the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust and Grayscale Ethereum Trust.
Cynthia Lummis is well known as a Bitcoin supporter. Originating from Wyoming, she has made it clear since her election that she intends to spread awareness about cryptocurrencies, not least with Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen. Together with Patrick Toomey (and Ron Wyden), she signed the amendment that modified the Infrastructure Bill in a less stringent sense, preventing any entity, including transaction validators or wallet developers, from being considered brokers. The amendment was then ditched.
Gold is better?
Looking through the chart, several politicians have investments in gold. At least a dozen have chosen gold derivatives or gold trusts. Some have opted for small amounts, but others have opted for a large sum.
Bill Hagerty, Republican of Tennessee, has between $50,000 and $100,000 in gold trusts.
Roger Marshall, Republican of Kansas, has between $15,000 and $50,000 in silver trusts.
And then there are those who prefer the good old-fashioned stocks. This is the case of Dwight Evans, a Democrat from Pennsylvania, who has shares in ARK Investment, PayPal, Tesla and Western Union.
From this picture, it appears that, at least for now, very few US politicians have invested in Bitcoin. This also explains the scepticism that is rampant in Congress when it comes to cryptocurrencies, despite the numerous laws that have been filed on the subject.
It will be up to Cynthia Lummis and Patrick Toomey to reverse this trend.
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