FTX junior executive Nishad Singh wanted to indirectly donate $1.1 million to Becca Balint, supporting Vermont politics.
Cryptocurrency and politics: FTX executive supports Becca Balint
In the state of Vermont, candidate Becca Balint, a state senator running for the only available seat in the state, received a $1.1 million donation from a single supporter.
Party funding can be direct or indirect in the United States of America and can be done through fundraising at conventions, online, or alternatively through donations.
Often U.S. citizens or lobbyists use this practice to empower the campaign of the party or candidate they deem worthy to represent them in government.
On July 9, Singh thus contributed $1.1 million to the federal political action committee of the LGBT Victory Fund, which turned over $991,911 in an ad campaign in support of Balint, the first woman and openly gay person to serve as president pro tem in the state of Vermont.
Overall, Singh has made political donations to LGBT-supportive election campaigns and pandemic prevention and control measures amounting to $7.9 million.
Singh, in a statement to Forbes, said:
“I was really excited about Balint because she is a strong advocate for pandemic prevention,” Singh said in a statement to Forbes. “Victory PAC wanted to run independent spending to support Balint, I wanted to authorize them to do so. My contribution here has been personal and independent of my role in FTX.”
The candidate, who has already won the primary and saw no major obstacles to winning the seat, could have done without Singh’s donation. The Federal Election Commission audited these donations and ruled that they were legal.
Cryptocurrency donations in politics
Over time, more than 300 donations have been made to politicians in cryptocurrency with amounts ranging from $250 to on the order of a few million each, sums that certainly give a major booster to individual candidates’ election campaigns and provide breathing room for parties.
Martin Dobelle, CEO of Engage Labs, a company that deals with campaigns and tools for accepting cryptocurrency donations said:
“This is definitely a new generation, a new kind of cohort, which is politically involved, which has an ideological composition never seen before. You see some people who are more libertarian economically, but are very socially progressive. So mixes that are traditionally not put together. to keep quiet in one party or another.”
Contributions to politicians and their parties have also taken on stratospheric figures. The record is held by FTX CEO Bankman-Fried, with a $10 million donation to the Protect Our Future fund, a political action committee largely funded by the cryptocurrency billionaire and committed to supporting candidates who prioritize pandemic prevention.
Bankman-Fried told the Pushkin Industries podcast that it planned to spend between $100 million and $1 billion on the 2024 U.S. presidential election campaigns.
The platform said the total number of candidates accepting campaign contributions via digital currencies is 15, of which 8 are Democrats, 6 are Republicans, and 1 is from the United Utah Party.
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