“Government efficiency” is the buzzword of the moment, with President Donald Trump having appointed Elon Musk to head an advisory commission called the “Department of Government Efficiency.” The acronym DOGE is inspired by a cryptographic coin with a pleasant name that Musk has long celebrated and profited from.
While the Musk-led DOGE project claims to aim to increase government efficiency (a potentially convenient euphemism for oligarchs who want to achieve even lower taxes and remove regulatory restrictions), DOGE-like coins could be used to help politicians indulge in more corruption. effectively.
Friday evening on Truth Social, Trump announced a new digital token called $TRUMP.
Friday evening on Truth Social, Trump announced a new digital token called $TRUMP. His account posted: “My NEW official Trump meme is HERE! It’s time to celebrate everything we stand for: WINNING! » On Thursday, Trump said his administration would consider creating a “national stockpile of digital assets,” an announcement that fell short of creating the reserve that crypto supporters wanted him to announce. The price of Trump’s coin quickly skyrocketed. to $75, a 650% increase from its launch price on Friday. On Sunday evening, Jon Christian, editor-in-chief of Futurism, claimed that “it appears that Trump has now accumulated far more wealth in the last 24 hours than he has in his entire life previously.” . The price started to fall on Sunday afternoon after the introduction of a $MELANIA coin. As of Thursday afternoon, the price of $TRUMP was hovering around $36.
There is substantial evidence to suggest that during the first Trump administration, the Trump family benefited from foreign entities purchasing blocks of rooms in Trump-owned hotels. There are crude stories about how much the Secret Service racked up fees for golf carts so it could protect Trump during the hundreds of rounds of golf he chose to play at Trump-owned golf courses. Additionally, the Trump family appears to have received trademarks in China around the time the president softened his stance toward Chinese telecommunications company ZTE. In October 2019, when acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney announced that the 46th G7 summit would take place. held at a Trump-owned hotel in Miami, he insisted it was no problem and said Trump “has made it very clear since he got here that he is not taking advantage of be here” and that he “I will not enjoy here.” Lawsuits against Trump, alleging he violated the Constitution’s Emoluments Clause, were dismissed as moot after President Joe Biden took office.
There was no shortage of smoke, suggesting the fires of corruption were burning under Trump 1.0.
There was no shortage of smoke, suggesting the fires of corruption were burning under Trump 1.0. However, even a summary of the disturbing facts from the tireless corruption watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington led to no allegations of life-changing gains for the Trump family during their first mandate. But by accumulating more money in 24 hours than him. what he has experienced in his entire life is different – and disturbing.
The way Trump made money during his first administration was accompanied by spending. Golf carts are not free and require maintenance and storage. Managing a hotel is a real business with real costs.
Crypto is not, in any meaningful sense, real. The ongoing expenses associated with launching the code into the universe are… minimal.
If Trump wants to make a lot more money this time around, he could hardly have come up with a better plan than crypto. Why should people care about Trump marketing a coin? Several reasons come to mind. First, the fact that Trump has billions of dollars of wealth tied up in cryptocurrency would obviously impact how his administration approaches regulating the cryptocurrency market. Will Trump fight for the public interest by regulating crypto – a key mechanism for financing ransomware, fentanyl and terrorism – if it could threaten the lucrative digital assets sector, an outsized share of which is controlled by a small elite?
Second, cryptocurrency markets are often believed to be manipulated by “whales,” i.e. large investors. Having a Trump asset so susceptible to manipulation is very concerning. Consider whales that could manipulate the value of the Trump coin to buy influence with the president by intervening in purchases at strategic times.
We shouldn’t want the president to focus on fluctuations in the value of a coin.
Since, as NBC News reported, “the wallets of all holders… are visible on the blockchain,” Trump would understand who defended him. But it’s hard to imagine any criminal liability (unlike if they had handed over, say, gold bars to Trump), since they could simply claim that they thought the price of the asset was too attractive to pass up. Do we think, for example, that Chinese multinational corporations might have reason to try to get on Trump’s good side? TikTok’s history suggests it’s possible. It would be better for America if Trump’s wealth was invested in mutual funds, the traditional, boring tools of wealth management. We shouldn’t want the president to focus on fluctuations in the value of a coin.
So, for those focused on the public interest, Trump’s emergence as a crypto billionaire is very distressing. And vigilance is required.
