Molly White's Citation Needed - Issue 101 – Bought and paid for

Episode Date: February 27, 2026

Bitcoin is down 50%, several prominent industry figures have been uncovered in the Epstein files, Trump’s facing a probe into his family’s $500M deal with the UAE, and crypto super PACs spend their first $6 million in the midterms. Originally published February 26, 2026.

I'm Molly White, and you're listening to the audio feed for the citation-needed newsletter. You can see the text version of the newsletter online at citation-needed.news. Issue 101, bought and paid for. Bitcoin is down 50%. Several prominent industry figures have been uncovered in the Epstein files. Trump's facing a probe into his family's $500 million deal with the UAE, and Crypto Super PACs spend their first $6 million. in the midterms. This issue was originally published on February 26, 26.

Bitcoin's slide to its lowest price in more than a year, down 50% from its October highs, has fueled growing concerns that the market has entered another crypto winter. Traders are searching for someone to blame, and some have landed on Binance, whose October 10 liquidation catastrophe coincided with, or caused crypto's downturn. And those traders are not limited to obscure social media conspiracy theorists. Ark Invest CEO Kathy Wood and OKX founder Starsu have both suggested Binance played a role in Bitcoin's recent weakness. Solomon Benai, a former SEC and CFTC staffer who now works as general counsel to a crypto

firm, has suggested that regulators should open an investigation into the October flash crash. Binance and its former CEO, Cheng Peng Zhao, deny any responsibility for the downturn. Zhao has suggested the accusations come from traders who simply want Binance to repay their trading losses. Regardless of its cause, fallout from the crash is beginning to surface. As I've mentioned repeatedly, there's often a delay between a crypto price crash and visible evidence of damage, as companies spend weeks or months floundering before they can no longer keep their struggles out of the public eye. In November 2022, after FTX's collapse, I wrote, quote, right now I think a lot of people following the crypto industry are holding their breath,

watching closely as other major dominoes wobble perilously. Similar wobbling is happening now. The Gemini Crypto Exchange has just laid off 25% of its workforce, ditched at least three sea-level executives, and announced an exit from the UK, EU, and Australia. As CEOs are wont to do these days, the Winklevosses have tried to spin the layoffs as a good omen for a company embracing AI. But financial analyst Matthew Code explained, quote,

the biggest issue here is that Gemini's management team placed a big bet on the crypto bull market run continuing through 2027, and instead, crypto asset prices have cratered. I can't believe it. The number go up forever business model has never failed us before. Blockfills, a Susquehanna and CME Ventures-backed crypto lender,

halted withdrawals on February 11 in a move that sparked flashbacks of the wave of withdrawal limits or halts that came as companies tried to halt their freefall in 2022. Sources at the company later revealed the firm had suffered $75 million in losses on their loans as crypto prices dropped, and co-founder and CEO Nicholas Hammer abruptly resigned. The firm is now reportedly looking for a buyer. Meanwhile, crypto is reeling from the latest wave of Epstein Files' disclosures, which show numerous cryptophagus corresponding with the late child sex offender. Tether co-founder Brock Pierce was already known to have communicated with Epstein, though a Pierce spokesperson had previously downplayed their

relationship as merely a, quote, few communications related to cryptocurrency. New emails show extensive correspondence with Pierce, who at one point thanked Epstein for, quote, a great time with the girls after a meeting in which Epstein had instructed Pierce to, quote, leave your girlfriend home. At one point, after Pierce fails to meet with someone, Epstein refers to as, quote, My New Russian, Pierce offers to introduce Epstein to, quote, a girl in New York you might like. Epstein also corresponds with a former assistant of his, who had a romantic relationship with Pierce. At one point in 2018, Pierce mentions that he's, quote, ready to marry her, though I'll have two wives, going to attempt to thread that needle over the next few days with my wife.

Epstein also discussed the marriage prospect with the woman, with Epstein seemingly excited to have access to a close confidant of Pierce's. The woman ultimately declined Pierce's proposal, though she suggested she might be open to it if it was the only option to procure her a visa. The relationship later ended. Pierce and Epstein also talked business, with Pierce introducing Epstein to an opportunity to invest in the then-nacent Coinbase cryptocurrency exchange. Epstein later invested $3 million into Coinbase's Series C, and the emails show that Coinbase co-founder Fred Ersum was aware that the investment was coming from Epstein, even years after Epstein had pleaded guilty to sexually abusing a miner. Erson left Coinbase in 2017, but remains its board director.

He founded the Paradigm Crypto Venture Fund in 2018. Epstein also corresponded with Adam Back, a bitcoinser so early on the scene that he once emailed directly with Satoshi Nakamoto. Back is the co-founder and CEO of the Blockstream crypto firm, and Epstein invested in Blockstream in 2014 via a fund associated with Joy Ito. Other emails show that Back and his co-founder, Austin Hill, likely visited Epstein's Island. Following the publication of these emails, Back downplayed Epstein's investment and claimed that Edo's fund divested its shares, quote, a few months later, due to a potential conflict of interest and other concerns. Other crypto figures are mentioned in the emails, though no evidence has emerged that they

corresponded directly. On April 22nd, 2014, Epstein received an email with the subject line, New Plan, from a redacted sender, containing simply the name Tyler Winklevoss. Days later, Epstein emailed Joy Ito, quote, do you know the Winklevoss boys? Ito replied to say he did not. On June 5th, Epstein emailed Pierce to ask, quote, do you know the Winklevosses? I don't. Pierce responded, yes, how can I have?

Euststein replied, quote, I'd like to send redacted to them to get a download of what they were doing in the space. I prefer not to go through the Silicon Valley gossip mafia. Micro Strategies Michael Saylor has mentioned several times, and although he's not among Epstein's pen pals, he still comes out of this looking bad. Multiple emails describe him as oblivious, clumsily attempting to buy influence. In an email exchange describing Saylor as, quote, the guy with the 160-foot fed ship. Hollywood publicist Peggy Siegel writes, quote,

I think David Rubin might be a better boat owner, parentheses 242. He seems like a more stable new friend. Shortly after Seagel met Sailor, she wrote in another email to Epstein, quote, Jackie Safra gave us $10,000 worth of wine from his own Napa Valley Vineyard, kids drinking $100 bottles of wine, and Michael Saylor giving $25,000 for food and the opportunity to get his name on invite and meet a hip group. Sailor is a complete creep. He has no personality, sort of like a zombie on a drug. We had smart directors sitting next to him and his idiot gorgeous date and could not get any conversation

out of him except, quote, I have a yacht I am taking to Ken. I walked him around and he was so weird that even I ran away from him. There is an obvious personal disconnect, and I don't think I can just take his money and deliver a better life because he has no feel for social behavior. In the courts, SBF. Still apparently believing his lawyers were merely an impediment to his own winning legal strategy, one that included his disastrous decision to testify in his own defense, Sam Bankman-Freed has filed a pro se motion for a new trial. The filing came via his mother, Barbara Fried,

though she was careful to note that Bankman-Fried would be representing himself and that she was submitting the filing on his behalf simply because he is in jail. Bankmanfried seems to be trying to exhaust all possible options. The motion comes as he waits for a decision on his appeal before the Second Circuit, and he is continuing to fawn over Trump on Twitter in an extremely unsubtle bid for a pardon. In January, Trump told the New York Times he had no intention of pardoning Bankman Fried, and spokespeople for the White House have recently reiterated that position. Jane Street

The administrator overseeing the wind-down of Doquan, Terraform Labs has filed a lawsuit against Jane Street, a major American quantitative trading firm. The heavily redacted complaint alleges that Jane Street exploited insider information about Terraform Labs operations, obtained via Bryce Pratt, an employee who previously interned at TFL and maintained close relationships with former co-workers, both unlawfully profiting from it and accelerating the May 2022 collapse of the Terra or UST stable coin ecosystem. The complaint, portrays Pratt's activities as explicitly directed by Jane Street leadership, alleging that, quote, Jane Street deployed Bryce Pratt to establish lines of communication with his

former colleagues at Terraform. After landing a systems engineer role at Jane Street, the former Terraform Lab software development in turn stayed in contact with his TFL co-workers, including a software developer and the head of research. In a group chat named Bryce's Secret, the three allegedly discussed a, quote, certain trading company that might be interested in investing in TFL. The TFL software engineer soon made it explicit, quote, bro, we all know who the buyer is, it's where you work. Once Pratt made more formal introductions between TFL and Jane Street higher-ups, he allegedly continued to use his insider knowledge and connections to give Jane Street an advantage. When TFL migrated to a new liquidity pool for UST,

Jane Street allegedly exploited insider access to timing details to make a significant trade, causing a steep sell-off that contributed to UST's May 2022 DPEG. The complaint alleges Jane Street also used its access to dodge the fallout from the subsequent collapse. Quote, its abuse of material non-public information from insider redacted allowed Jane Street to unwind hundreds of millions of dollars in potential exposure at precisely the right time, mere hours before the Terraform ecosystem collapsed. Jane Street then allegedly continued trading on inside information to profit even as Terra was in freefall. Kevin O'Leary and Ben Bitboy Armstrong.

Kevin O'Leary has won a $2.828 million default judgment in his defamation lawsuit against the crypto influencer Ben Armstrong, known online as BitBoy Crypto. The suit was originally filed in March 2025, after BitBee. repeatedly accused O'Leary of being a murderer, referring to a 2019 boating accident involving O'Leary and his wife, in which two other boaters were killed. Bitboy has been going through something of a slow-motion meltdown since at least 2023, which I have only briefly covered when he's been arrested or wound up in court, because it's been evident for quite some time that he's dealing with serious mental health

issues. That's supported in a belated filing to set aside the default judgment, which came from Bitboy's uncle, and which states that Bitboy has been to be able to been diagnosed with bipolar disorder, narcissistic personality disorder, disassociative identity disorder, Kotard syndrome, which is a disorder in which the affected person believes they are dead, and Capgras delusion, the delusion that close family members have been replaced by identical impostors. Because Bitboy and his uncle missed numerous court deadlines and failed to respond to court orders or appear for hearings, the motion to set aside the judgment was denied. Everything else.

Brandon Coroney, the CEO of the Safe Moon Pump and Dump Scheme, has been sentenced to eight years in prison. Rucheng Lin, the operator of the Incognito Market, Darkweb Drug Marketplace, has been sentenced to 20 years in prison. Besides the drug crimes, Lin also stole at least $1 million in user deposits from Incognito Market's internal payment system and tried to extort both vendors and buyers for more by threatening to public. their transaction histories. In Congress, the Clarity Act cryptocurrency market structure bill is still stalled out in the Senate after Coinbase blocked it in mid-January. The decision earned mixed reactions from all sides. At Davos in January, banker Jamie Diamond pointed at Armstrong and declared you were full of shit, accusing him of lying in statements that blamed banks for sabotaging

the legislation. Other companies in the crypto sector have urged for the bill to move forward. fearful that Coinbase's unilateral objection could kill what they see as a general improvement to the status quo. And Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has complained that, quote, there seems to be a nihilist group in the industry who prefers no regulation over this very good regulation, adding that those in the crypto industry who disapprove of it, quote, should move to El Salvador. You're telling me there are people in the crypto industry who would prefer no regulation over regulation? say it isn't so. Simultaneously, letters and public statements have been flying out of both branches of Congress

over various Trump corruption concerns. On January 31st, the Wall Street Journal reported that the UAE's so-called spy Shi'ike Tenoon bin Zaya del Nayan had paid $500 million to acquire a 49% stake in World Liberty Financial, the cryptocurrency company run by family members of both Trump and Special Envoy to the Middle East, Steve Whitkoff. After several months and multiple meetings involving Trump, Whitkoff, and others, the White House approved a deal to grant the UAE access to sensitive AI chips. Congresspeople had already sounded the alarm over the apparent quid pro quo, even before the $500 million deal was known due to UAE enrichment of Trump

through their selection of the Trump family's stable coin in a finance investment that will ultimately leave more than $150 million in interest with Trump entities. The new details have sparked. even more outcry, with Senator Murphy, a Democrat from Connecticut, describing the deal as having the, quote, elements of a bribe and, quote, potentially criminal. On February 4, Representative Rocana, a Democrat from California, announced an investigation into the deal in his capacity as ranking member of the House Select Committee on the CCP. President Trump has claimed no knowledge of the WLF deal, stating at a press conference,

quote, I don't know about it. My sons are handling that. My family is handling that. Senator Blumenthal, the other Democrat from Connecticut, has opened an investigation into Binance as the ranking member of the Homeland Security Committee's subcommittee on investigations. This followed reporting from the New York Times, alleging that Binance's own internal investigators uncovered more than 1,500 accounts on the platform that had been accessed from Iran, and around $1.7 billion in transactions from two Binance accounts to Iran-linked entities, including an account belonging to an Iranian military group. A separate Wall Street Journal report said the investigators had also discovered another $500 million that had gone to the Iranian entities. Reports from the New York Times, Fortune, and the Wall Street Journal then found that Binance had fired the investigators who uncovered the transactions, leaving the accounts untouched. Binance has insisted the reports are false, claiming their internal review found no evidence of sanctions violations and that the investigators left of their own

volition. CEO Richard Tang even took to Twitter to publish a letter sent on Binance's behalf to the journal by attorney and so-called reputation and crisis manager Amber Melville Brown, demanding the journal retract the article. Unfortunately for Binance, its years-long pattern of dismissing even mild criticism as FUD has eroded the credibility of such denials, particularly given that some of those dismissals have been followed by evidence proving the original reports true. After comptroller Jonathan Gold refused Senator Warren's request to delay the review of World Liberty Financial's application for a National Trust Bank charter, 41 House Democrats have sent their own letter to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent about the issue, with questions about potential foreign influence on the U.S. banking system,

as well as the degree to which the White House influences OCC decision-making. While the letter included signatures from the expected cryptoskeptical lawmakers like Brad Sherman of California and Stephen Lynch of Massachusetts, it was also notably signed by some of the industry's biggest Democratic allies in the House, like Richie Torres of New York and Sam LaCardo of California. Bessent also received a letter from Senator Warren, which followed up on Besson's responses to a line of questioning

at a House Financial Services Committee hearing about the possibility that he might direct banks to bail out Bitcoin. While he was clear at the hearing that he didn't have the authority to do that, either as Treasury Secretary or as the chair of the Financial Stability Oversight Council, Warren was looking for written confirmation. She also accused Bessent of dodging a question about whether, quote, the money of our taxpayers is going to be deployed into crypto assets, writing that, quote, rather than giving a simple no, he deflected,

stating that, quote, we are retaining seized Bitcoin. While the president's March 2025 executive order establishing a strategic Bitcoin Reserve does instruct the government to stockpile rather than sell seized Bitcoin, it also states that efforts to acquire additional Bitcoin for the stockpile must be, quote, budget neutral and not impose incremental costs on United States taxpayers. Why Besson invoked the reserve is unclear to me, unless he thinks Congress is worried about seizing assets from taxpaying criminals. Inregulators.

SEC The House Committee on Financial Services held an oversight of the securities and exchange, Commission hearing with SEC Chairman Paul Atkins. Republicans were fairly quiet on the topic of crypto, save for a few who used the opportunity to bash former chairman Gary Gensler, who has not been a part of the SEC for more than a year. Democrats were much more pointed, asking questions about the agency's decision to drop more than 60% of cases involving the crypto sector, and about corruption involving Trump and his companies. Atkins was extremely evasive, at one point claiming to have merely, quote, heard the name of the president's Trump Media and Technology Group

when answering questions from Representative Al Green, a Democrat from Texas. This seems implausible, given that he has received a letter from Senator Warren specifically regarding the company. The SEC is actively considering applications from the company, and the company demanded the SEC open an investigation into alleged naked short-selling of their stock right as Atkins was joining the commission. When asked about the long list of paused or dropped enforcement cases against crypto companies, Atkins refused to answer questions pertaining to, quote, ongoing investigations, even though several have formally concluded.

Representative Rashida Talib, a Democrat from Michigan, remarked, So crypto intervened in dozens of elections across our nation spending more than banks and oil companies. Experts have called it, quote, one of the most aggressive corporate spending sprees and moderate political history. Fast forward to today, Mr. Chair, in the SEC, and the SEC has dismissed, right, fast forward, dismissed or state enforcement actions against major crypto-related donors or supporters of President Trump, such as Coinbase, Cracken, Binance, Justin's son. The commission has seen a significant reduction in staffing, of course, right, with perhaps

one in five staffers leaving, whistleblower awards are down dramatically, and policies are issued without allowing public comment. Do you see what I'm saying here? And the SEC has basically stopped its enforcement efforts in favor of regulation by the CFTC, which has far fewer resources and staff. So my residents are asking, is this a coincidence? I don't think so. And I said, Mr. Chairman, you know, out of all due respect, I hope you understand the incredible importance of your position. Because it looks to me like cryptocurrency is getting a tremendous return in its political investments. I can't fault anyone who thinks your agency is bought and paid for. Ranking member of the Digital Assets Subcommittee, Stephen Lynch, a Democrat from Massachusetts,

seemed to try to appeal to Atkins' fondness for the crypto sector, saying, Look, this is hurting the crypto industry. All these scams? I mean, look at crypto today. I think it's down 25% in the last month. People are losing trust in that. This is not good for crypto. It's certainly not good for consumers.

And it's awful. The reputational damage that the SEC is suffering right now is unbelievable. CFTC. The CFTC is staking its claim on regulating prediction markets by submitting an amicus brief in Crypto.com versus Nevada and threatening state gaming regulators who have been trying to fill the regulatory void that the CFTC will, quote, see them in court.

Newly installed CFTC chairman Mike Seelig posted a video to Twitter about how prediction markets, quote, have been hit with an onslaught of state-led litigation. He waxed poetic about how said markets, quote, provide useful functions for society by allowing everyday Americans to hedge commercial risks like increases in temperature and energy price spikes. and adding that they also, quote, serve as an important check on our news media and our information streams. Seleague conveniently admits that the vast majority of activity on these prediction markets is sports gambling, not commercial hedging. He also appears to have invented a novel role for the CFTC as guardian of America's media ecosystem, a function notably absent from the agency's statutory mandate. Since the CFTC has filed no enforcement actions against prediction markets after embracing the sector following

Trump's election, Seelig's jurisdictional claim seems designed to shield the sector rather than regulate it. And as Seelig is declaring exclusive jurisdiction over a rapidly expanding sector, the agency's enforcement ability is dwindling, as staff resign and moss. Earlier this month, Barron's reported that the last person on the once-20-person team of top enforcement attorneys in investigators at the CFTC's flagship Chicago office has resigned. Much of the Chicago office's decimation occurred under Seleague's predecessor, acting chair Caroline Pham, who, quote, undertook a sweeping reorganization of the enforcement division and closed about half of its open cases, sometimes without consulting the

teams involved. When Seelig was confirmed by the Senate, FAMM resigned and days later announced she would be joining the crypto firm and frequent Trump business partner MoonPay. OCC. The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency has started approving the slew of applications for National Trust Bank charters from the crypto sector, beginning with Erebor, a bank backed by Peter Thiel, Joe Lonsdale, Palmer Lucky, and Andrescent Horowitz. Startlingly, Erebor seeks to, quote, fill the gap left by Silicon Valley Bank, the tech startup focused bank that failed in March 2023. In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, Lucky seemed to be trying to set low-executive. expectations for the quality of Erebor's banking services. Quote, you can think of us like a farmer's bank for tech.

I think most farmers banks won't claim they're the best bankers in the world, but they do understand farmers. Circle, ripple, Paxos, Stripes Bridge, and Crypto.com have received conditional approval for their charter applications. Coinbases and President Trump's own World Liberty Financial also have applications open. Trump Business Interests On February 18, World Liberty Financial hosted a World Liberty Forum at Mar-Lago. Finance founder Chang Peng Zhao attended in its first U.S. appearance since his October pardon.

Attendees also included crypto executives from Coinbase and BitGo, leaders of tradfied giants, Goldman Sachs, Franklin Templeton, the NASDAQ and the New York Stock Exchange, as well as a smattering of celebrities, from FIFA President Gianni Infantino to rapper Nikki Minaj, who seemed a little confused about why. she'd been invited, stating on stage that she, quote, can like crypto, and then going on to talk about her stick-on-nail brand. While ostensibly separate from presidential business, the conference drew Senators Ashley Moody, a Republican from Florida, and Bernie Moreno, a Republican from Ohio, as well as cabinet member Kelly Loughler and CFTC chair Michael Seelig, and cryptocurrency legislation was a recurring topic of conversation. Several days later, World Liberty Financial's USD-1 stable coin briefly lost its peg during a sudden sell-off, dropping to around 99 cents. Around the same time, posts about the company and its stable coin vanished from Eric Trump's Twitter account.

WLF quickly put out a tweet that there was a, quote, coordinated attack against USD1 this morning. Attackers hacked several WLFI co-founder accounts, paid influencers to spread fud, and opened massive WLFI shorts to profit from the manufactured chaos. It's difficult to fathom why, hackers would compromise an account as high profile as Eric Trump's, only to delete a handful of tweets, and the claim was broadly met with skepticism. In prediction markets. As the CFTC runs interference for prediction markets in the courts, Kalshi has disclosed the results of two of its internal insider trading cases cleared from what the

company is described as a, quote, backlog of insider trading cases. One involves a video editor working for YouTube star Mr. Beast, who used his or early access to Mr. Beasts' content to profit from around $4,000 in wagers on markets involving what words Mr. Beast would say. The traders, quote, near-perfect trading success on markets with low odds, raised red flags in Kalshi's monitoring systems, and the editor was fined more than $20,000 and suspended from Kalsi for two years. The second case involved Kyle Langford, a neo-Nazi who was briefly a candidate in the California gubernatorial race before withdrawing and entering the race for California's District 26. His case probably didn't require much investigation,

given Langford had in May 2025, tweeted a screen cap of himself, placing a roughly $100 Calci wager on himself being elected governor of California. He was fined $2,246 for improperly profiting from a trade on a market where he was a, quote, direct decision maker, though he didn't profit much, as $2,000 of the fine was a penalty. He was also, banned from Kalshi for five years. While the CFTC acknowledged Kalshi's disciplinary actions, they showed no signs of opening their own investigations, either into the traders or into Kalshi itself. The CFTC has a responsibility to ensure designated contract markets like Kalshi are sufficiently self-policing, yet the agency appears uninterested in how Kalshi developed a

month's long backlog of suspicious behavior or why it waited months after markets closed to take action. Meanwhile, Kalshi and Polly Market have been running various marketing stunts. Both platforms have been giving away free groceries in New York City, and Polly Market announced plans to open what they're calling the Polly Market, New York's first free grocery store, a five-day pop-up promotion. Kalshi has also been running TikTok ads featuring young women with captions like, quote, POV, I was about to be unable to pay my rent, but I got two years of rent through Kalshi's predictions. It's amazing.

and, quote, me, because in 2026 I stopped working weekends and started predicting weather instead, making $280 a week now versus $190 before. This drew criticism from, of all people, the CEO of a crypto casino called Bethog. He compared Calci's marketing to the trajectory of the vape company Jewel, which pushed its products on, quote, non-smokers and particularly kids. See the similarity? The backlash took time to build, but when it did, it was devastating for the company. He commented on how he's worked in online gambling for more than 25 years, and quote,

this type of marketing is actually extremely rare in real money gaming. Firstly, and most importantly, it is rare because operators view it as highly unethical. It might surprise you that a lot of people in the gaming industry do actually care about things like underage and problem gambling. Secondly, it is also rare because it doesn't work. Do you think the teenagers in these ads are going to keep playing when they lose all their rent money? In elections and political influence. In last week's issue about the crypto industry's war chest for the midterms, I wrote, quote,

the pro-cry super PACs have barely touched their accumulated cash so far. The reports at the time had mostly only shown expenditures from last year of around $3.2 million into various 2025 special elections. $42,000 from First Principles Digital to support Republican Mike Rogers' Michigan's Senate campaign marked the only spending from super PACs on upcoming races. However, the Fairshake Super PAC Network, comprising Fairshake, protect progress, and defend American jobs, has since reported $6.2 million in expenditures starting February 5th. The largest single expense was just over $2 million in ads and direct mail to support Republican

candidate for Alabama Senate and current Alabama representative Barry Moore, who is looking to replace incumbent Tommy Tuberville. Tuberville is not running for re-election, instead opting to run for Alabama governor. This is reportedly just the beginning of a planned $5 million spend on advertisements highlighting Trump's endorsement of Moore. Moore has voted in favor of all crypto legislation that has come before the House during his tenure, and he was endorsed by Wyoming Senator Cynthia Lummis earlier this year. She was delighted that Moore is, quote, one of the few members of Congress to personally own crypto assets. Moore has held between $1,000 and $15,000 in Bitcoin since his first filing in 2020,

and he added another $1,000 to $15,000 in March, 2024. The other fair shake spending has mostly targeted races in states with March primaries, namely Texas, Illinois, Arkansas, and North Carolina. The PACs dropped more than $1.5 million in support behind Democrat Christian Menafee in Texas' District 18 primary race against Al Green, the current representative for Texas' redistricted ninth, who sits on the House Financial Services Committee. A spokesperson for Fairshake told the New York Times that Green is, quote, actively hostile towards a growing Texas crypto community and has, quote,

decided to try and stop American innovation in its tracks. It probably doesn't help that Green has been outspoken about Trump's corruption and demanded his impeachment. Benefi, on the other hand, has earned an A rating from Coinbase linked advocacy group stand with crypto, seemingly solely based on responses to their questionnaire, where he wrote that, quote, the federal government should set clear fair rules that punish fraudsters and promote transparency while leaving room for innovation, and we should make sure the next generation of blockchain innovation is built in America. His website also holds nods to both blockchains and artificial intelligence, referencing Menefi's history of, quote, championing innovation. Also in Texas,

the Fairshake Network has put $260,000. behind Republican Jessica Steinman in District 8, $92,000 behind Chris Gober in District 10, and 142,000 behind Trevor Nells in District 22. Nels has raised barely over $100,000 on his own, so that should be a nice help to him. Fairshake also spent more than $1.5 million to oppose Lashon Ford in his Democratic primary in Illinois' 7th District, more than three times the amount Ford has raised. The money went toward an ad campaign, stating that Ford, quote, was indicted on 17 counts, the verdict, Ford convicted on tax fraud. The Illinois Wednesday Journal criticized the ad for, quote, falsely implying that he was convicted of felonies related to bank fraud,

noting that the 17 charges against Ford were dropped and that Ford had pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor tax charge. Ford also spoke out against the spending, describing it as blood money, motivated by his August 2025 vote in the Illinois House. House in favor of a bill creating the Digital Assets and Consumer Protection Act, which imposes regulatory requirements on cryptocurrency business in the state. In Illinois's second district, Fairshake spent $41,000 to oppose Democrat Robert Peters, who also supported that bill. Peters also has the endorsement of Senator Elizabeth Warren, whose support contributed to drawing more than $10 million in opposition spending from Fairshake against Katie Porter in 24. A spokesperson for Peters issued a statement that, quote, super PACs funded by Trump-aligned billionaires

are dumping millions of dollars into this race to try to buy this seat and subvert the will of the electorate. They're all in for my opponent because he's already shown that he can be bought, and I've made it clear that I can't. This is a nod to opponent Jesse Jackson Jr.'s 1.1 million dollars in backing from the Think Big Pro-AI Industry Superpack. Josh Velasto is simultaneously one of the leaders of the pro-AI industry super PAC spending in support of Jackson, and the spokesperson for the Fareshake Pro-Crypto SuperPack spending against Peters. In Arkansas, the Fershake Network spent $384,000 to support longtime ally and chair of the House Financial Services Committee, French Hill, who is up for re-election in District 2. Besides the PAC spending, he's received more than $500,000

in support from Coinbase, Andreson Horowitz, the Winklevoss twins, and others. Finally, in North Carolina, the PAC spent $81,000 on Tim Moore's race in the 14th District. As Crypto Super PACs begin pouring their millions into federal races, Ripple founder Chris Larson and Bitcoin enthusiast Tim Draper are teaming up to fight California's wealth tax by spending heavily electing moderates. Larson has said he expects to spend $30 million on a, quote, counterforce to pro-labour legislators. There's a new 501C4 Dark Money Group on the list with the announcement of the Hyper Liquid Policy Center. The first goal on the group's list is to, quote, introduce lawmakers and regulators to Hyperliquid,

a decentralized crypto exchange launched in 2023. Thank goodness someone's finally doing that. The Web 3 is going just great recap. There were 10 entries between January 29 and February 25th, $199.68 million dollars, was added to the grift counter. Step Finance, Solana Flore, and Vermora markets shut down after a January hack. The yield block's lending pool was drained of $10.2 million. The Iotex Bridge was exploited for $2 million after a private key compromise.

South Korean prosecutors lost $22 million of seized crypto to the wallet inspector, but later recovered it. The Moonwell lending protocol suffered a $1.78 million loss after their second Oracle misconfiguration in four months. The Blockfills crypto lender halted withdrawals. BitThum accidentally gave away $44 billion to customers. The Gemini Crypto Exchange fired 25% of its staff, blaming AI. Cross-curve users were exploited for around $3 million, and $29 million was stolen from the step finance treasury wallets. In the news, I'm quoted again by David D. Kirkpatrick, in his most recent story for The New Yorker

about Trump's crypto and non-crypto-related profiteering from the presidency. I described the, quote, mind-boggling conflict of interest between two of the Trump family-involved companies, World Liberty Financial and Alt-5 Sigma, and the highly unusual Binance promotion, in which they pay their users to hold the Trump-linked USD-1 stable coin. That's titled, Trump's profiteering hits $4 billion.

I also spoke to Lamonde about the rise of prediction markets, and the shift towards everything becoming gambling. That's titled The Rise of Polymarket, the cryptocurrency-based betting site for current events. That's all for now, folks. Until next time, this is Ben, Molly White. Thanks for listening to this issue of the citation-needed newsletter. If you would like to support my work with a free

or pay-what-you-want subscription to the citation-needed newsletter, or if you would like to receive these issues in your email, go to citation needed.news. If you enjoyed the podcast version of this episode, please consider leaving a rating or review in your podcast player of choice.