The Wolf Of All Streets - EXCLUSIVE: Pro Bitcoin Democrat Running For California Gov | CryptoTownHall

Episode Date: September 23, 2025

This session of Crypto Town Hall was centered around a major announcement by Dennis Porter, CEO and cofounder of Satoshi Action Fund, which advocates for pro-Bitcoin laws and education. The highlight was the official campaign launch of Ian Calderon, former Majority Leader of the California Assembly, as a gubernatorial candidate with Bitcoin policy as a key platform. The panel also covered recent crypto news, shifting regulatory environments, the bipartisan need for crypto progress, market sentiment, and cycle analysis. The event stressed the strategic importance of Bitcoin advocacy on both state and national levels, and the urgent necessity for bipartisan political support to secure the industry's future.

Good morning, everybody. Welcome to Crypto Town Hall every weekday here on X at 10.15 a.m. Eastern Standard Time. good to see a lot of extra people in the audience today, obviously for the mass announcement from Dennis Porter, as it says above in the title. To be clear, we don't know what the announcement is. We've given him the platform to share, and that will happen later in the show as he's on the West Coast and we'll be joining. I know that there will be others joining with him. I just do not yet know who those people will be. But there is a lot to dig into on the show ahead of that. massive announcement. Seems like we're getting stories left and right today. This is one of those days where there just been a ton. We've got Fold selecting Stripe and Visa to power their new Fold Bitcoin credit card. Another huge one. I don't know, Dave, did you see that this just dropped literally a few minutes ago? 1.3 trillion Morgan Stanley to let E-Trade clients trade Bitcoin in the first half of 2026. So that's obviously another huge announcement. And then some pretty wild comments as well

from Senator Atkins. These are just a few of the stories that hit in the last few minutes. Senator. Senator. Sorry. SEC Chairman Atkins, a senator from the great state of not a senator, saying that he will introduce an innovation exemption by year end letting

crypto firms launch products without quote unquote burdensome rules. How about burdensome regulators and their rules? Well, I mean, it's funny. Well, two things. First, the Morgan Stanley, quote, news, unquote, is basically they made that announcement quite some time ago. It was in the winter, I think, you know, post-election, they announced they would be doing it.

And so this is basically to sharpening their pencil on their timeline. I mean, if you see, look, if you don't understand what happens to an asset class when literally tens of thousands of financial advisors can all of a sudden make a profit from making a recommendation versus not, then you're not paying attention to the history of Wall Street. So if you don't understand how big of a deal it is for Bitcoin in terms of gaining its mass adoption as an alternative to gold, think of it this way. The entirety of Wall Street will now have the ability

to make money recommending spot Bitcoin or self-custody where they can't make a dime from recommending gold. Where do you think they're going to be channeling people? I mean, look, whether you agree or not agree to talk about gold buzz, but you talk to people, follow the money is kind of important. And if you don't understand that's what's going to be developing over the next two or three years, you're literally asleep at the switch. And so you can say whatever you want to say.

That's just a simple fact. And we've seen it throughout history way too many times. And there's lots of other stuff that can be talked about. As far as Paul Atkins is concerned, look, there's a real. On table next Monday, I actually have just put the finishing touches on a comment letter that Ian and I are writing to it because we have very good data that shows that crypto markets handled well, function better than equity markets for institutions. That's a really strong statement.

And the reason for it is because the lack of really dumb prescriptive regulations that we've allowed to grow up in the equity markets. Now, for those who don't know, I've been involved on pretty much every industry committee that's ever existed in terms of market structure for the equity markets. I'm very friendly with all the people who deal with it. It is literally what you get when every firm lobbies for new rules and you have exchanges and all these for-profit entities in addition to all of the firms that want barriers to entry against competition to create rules. I mean, if you don't know how equities work, you have regulated tick sizes, you have regulated fees, you have this regulated,

that forces you to send orders to some to an exchange that displays a quote, even if it's for an infinitesimal size and you have very good reason to believe it's no longer there. All this stuff is true. It makes it very complicated, lots of messes traffic, enormous costs involved in all of the high frequency trading that goes on. And Paul Atkins was the person who wrote the dissent against that rule. So when he says what he's saying, he's essentially saying, listen, we understand that surveillance, is good. And anybody who saw what happened on Sunday night, our Monday morning should understand that having surveillance to know that if people are going to try manipulation, we would kind of like

to have a regulator to understand was it really manipulation. That's different. And basically that's what he's saying, is disclosure and surveillance is good, prescriptive rules are bad. Anyway, that's my monologue for this morning. Sorry, Scott. It's a good one. So I think it just speaks to the general regulatory environment, and once again, the SEC is sharpening their pencils here and reasserting that they will deliver on the promises of deregulation from before. There's also a joint SECFDC task force or meeting that is coming imminently that was in the news today as well. And you made the point yesterday when talking about the leverage flush of this weekend, the old leverage flush of two days ago. That was the big.

big topic. The fact that even if that had happened in the United States, the SEC would have effectively been regulating one market while the CFTC would have been regulating another. They may not have even been able to figure out who was manipulating the market on both sides of that trade. No, we know this through history. I mean, look, the flash crash in 2010, do you realize how long it took them to come to some conclusions? And they came to, like, idiotic conclusion that some idiot in his mother's basement triggered it, which is complete bullshit. it. I mean, yeah, he potentially had some slight causality, but it was absurd. And the reason is because futures and equity markets are interconnected, and they propose this thing called the

cat consolidated on a trail, which is massively expensive. We're now on its second iteration. It's still not fully done. They're still arguing over who's going to pay for it. And by the way, it doesn't include future, so it wouldn't have done a damn thing in understanding the flash crash anyway. By the way, that flashgrass was in 2010 for those who were tracking at home. So we're 15 years later, and they still don't have it. And a large part of coordinating between the agencies is to fix that. And you could fix it without spending enormous amounts of money. In fact, you could fix it pretty easily, but it would require the agencies to actually cooperate or be merged, because the U.S. is the only place on the planet that has the prudential regulators for both equity futures and equities in different.

regulators. So it really is a kind of a cluster fuck. There's no way around it. So understand that. But, you know, that's why they're having these, because Paul gets it. And his head of trading in markets, Jamie Selway, absolutely gets it. Oh, by the way, I talked to Carolyn Pham. And she gets it. She's the interim chair of the CFTC. And my guess is if Kintends isn't going to be, because I don't know, I don't know Brian, but I suspect he understands it. My suspicion is, is anybody that's appointed to that will understand that as well. So it is, it is interesting. Well, his announcement is actually extremely important because it means that lots of companies will be able to innovate and offer things. And so watch this space.

It's yet another thing that's not priced in. So we can go to any direction here. Obviously, we could have a conversation about the market, which I think is always a good sort of place setting here, what we're looking at. Andre, you got your buddy, Matt Hogan, out there, always with the amazing hot takes from Bitwise. saying that, you know, in the next year, he thinks that crypto owned by publicly traded companies will double, obviously making some large predictions about price. Where do people think we stand right now with the market

after that flush that we just discussed? Andrew, if you're up, you can go ahead. And then, Andre, I'd love to hear your thoughts. Yes, sure. I just wanted to add a couple of thoughts on top of... Go ahead, Andrew. Yeah, just real quickly on top of what Dave had to say. The SEC has never in their history moved at the pace that they're moving right now.

This is historic speed for the SEC, like absolutely historic speed. And it's coming on the heels of historic sort of knuckle dragging by Gary Gensler. So pay attention to what's happening with the regulatory bodies because the pace and speed at which they're going is extraordinary. And they're trying to keep up with innovation. And again, that innovation has been pressed by crypto across financial markets. So the way that financial markets are going to move and shift and be shaped over the next, let's call it, 18 to 36 months will also be historic, given that we'll have 24-7 training, all sorts of stuff is going to move and change. The SEC is trying to keep up with what they. know is innovation that's coming to all markets. So one, kudos to them and kudos to Paul

Atkins. But just be aware that this is this is not normal for regulatory bodies and the fact that the SEC is moving so fast as fast as it frankly actually can is is a credit to the work being done by crypto and some of the bodies associated with having conversations with regulatory folks in the crypto lobbies, let's call it. And then at the same time, those that persevered through the previous four years and, you know, stayed afloat to get to this moment. It is a historic moment, the pace and speed at which just the SEC is moving as I've never seen it happen before. Never. And Andre, before we jump to you and go to the market, since Andrew kind of kept that can of worms open, and we do have Ron. I mean, Ron, obviously, are always on top of what's happening on Capitol Hill with policy and regulators.

And this just more of this same, basically a reiteration from the SEC. Is there anything new here in your mind? You know, I think Dave talked about a little bit. You know, there are some rumors going around about what's happening more at the CFTC. I mean, they're doing very similar to the SEC with their crypto sprint and taking feedback and such. But obviously, they are very significantly limited with only having one commissioner with fam there right now. And Brian Clinton tends his nomination still really up in the air what's happening over there. And there's still four other commissioner slots that have to be filled.

So it's a little bit of a mess to some of the rumors going around is that there might be an effort to merge two agencies, as Dave was alluding to, because it is very different in the United States compared to the rest of the world. But, of course, politically, that's going to be run to a bunch of issues if that is a direction that the rumors end up being true. Wouldn't you think they would go with a joint task force or something, you know, that just kind of without consolidating the two agencies? Well, they've kind of happened plenty of these task force before. So that's the other thing. It's like there are plenty of working groups, task forces. There's so many at this point.

But at the same time, I mean, it does make political sense to combine them to, but there's a bunch of political hurdles if that were the UK. Ron, I think it's worth telling the audience that there's a lot of non-U.S. people here. the reason is money. Let's call it what it is. Being on the Agriculture Committee means that you have oversight of the CFTC, and that means all the financial firms are become donors to your campaigns. Being on the Finance Committee, obviously oversees the SEC, and once again, same financial firms, same donors. So right now you have two honeypots, and bringing into one honeypot means a whole pile of senators and congresspeople would lose that donor base because they no longer would have the quote power over that industry.

And while that is the absolute, in any objective sense, worst possible reason for leaving two agencies separate that should obviously be combined, it is, however, the single most important reason because money talks of bullshit walks in Washington. I wish it wasn't the case, but it is the case. We got a lot of cynical bitcoins who understand this kind of intuitively, but I think it's worth explaining that. I mean, I know you agree with me. Yeah, 100%. And I think it's going to mean the other dynamic that is the X factor in everything here these days in politics is Donald Trump. And if he puts his weight behind making this

happen and he has weighed in crypto politics several times. So, you know, this is always something that, you know, folks need to think about different than most administrations. To your point, though, Dave, you know, there's a lot of money and invested interest, though. So I'm surely push back. Again, if these rumors were to be true. And again, I'm really just like push it back. Like, we don't. know. But at the end of the day, it does make sense. And Trump could have a way here, but it's kind of funny that this way being regulator is that important to the administration to be even holding up the nomination at this point. So we'll just have to wait and see. Yeah, it seemed like

when Tens was a shoe-in. I mean, he was a darling of the last administration, and he's been around. So it's very surprising not to see him being confirmed quickly. But Ron, you know, just since we have you a couple other questions. Obviously, we kind of get the market structure update on a regular basis here. Has anything changed on that front? And then the other kind of news in this realm was the letter from a number of Republicans to the SEC to basically give him a kick in the butt to get Donald Trump's executive order on retirement accounts in action here. Yeah, so at least in the market structure front. We are, there's two big things to look at. So literally a week from today is the rumored mark up, the vote in the banking committee on their half of the market structure

bill. The problem that we is that we haven't seen the other half of the market structure bill. That's in the Senate agriculture committee. Hence why there's two committees involved, because there's two different regulators, to Dave's point of the whole issue with some of these policies and going through financing switch. But overall, we've seen at least the shutdown, probably the main factor here. The shutdown for the government is slayed to be this week from today as well. So we can likely see a delay on that markup. It's not official. We still are waiting for the notice, but we could see a delay on the market structure bill, vote maybe more into October, just given the shutdown drama. And it seems like we are barely towards shutdown. Both camps, Republican and Democrat are really digging

their heels. We'll see what the Democrats say after they meet with Trump later this week. But overall, as you watch the shutdown, it seems like it's barely in that direction that's going and probably delay market structure. And then to your point, on the regulatory side, there's still a lot of things going on, especially with the 401 letter you were talking about earlier. There's been pressure to more provide some clear guidance on that front. Again, to your point, it seems like to Andrew's point, they're blitzing through, at least at the SEC. And finally, just to focus more on the policy news front here.

We do have the big coin center dinner coming up on Thursday. And sometimes that's been used to make announcements from the SEC or CFTC. And Hester Perth is speaking again. So I look towards Thursday night. maybe we'll see some developments there or some news, kind of what actors is saying earlier. That's really good alpha. Go ahead, Tony. Yeah, I actually spoke to interviewed Congressman Tom Emmer just last week and, you know,

kind of pushed a bit on the timeline for the market structure. And it seems this is going to happen probably until December. Honestly, it's going to push through, as Ron mentioned, you got the government shut down and all these things and we know how slow Congress can move. So realistically, it looks like towards the end of Q4, they will have this bill passed. I'll be speaking to or interviewing Commissioner Hester Purs tomorrow in person. So I'll be sure to follow up on some of these big news items. It's exciting to see how fast the agencies are moving.

But to Ron's point, though, it's kind of weird what's happening at a CFDC. And a bit concerning that there's no commissioners. They're just one who's the acting chairs. So hopefully they get that resolved soon. Ron, here's a question. How far down the road can they kick the can before it becomes full midterm season? and then this ceases to be a priority at all? You know, at least in D.C. world, it tends to be kind of spring, late spring,

is when folks kind of decided to pack it up and focus solely on the November elections. So that's usually when folks look at it. So even if we kind of bleed into January and February, potentially, I'm not too concerned. But again, whatever comes out of the Senate and gets voted on has to go back to the House because it will be different than what the House passed, which is clarity, it seems like. So that's just another X factor here. And then finally, again, when Trump does get involved, because he will, he got involved in Genius Act. I'm sure that will bring other dynamics into play on that front.

So there's me a lot of drama with this bill. I'm sure we'll see the Credit Card Competition Act amendment come back again. That's more on interchange fees and credit cards. But, yeah, there's a lot of drama. It's crypto and politics. And we combine the two together. It's never boring. Let's step back to the market side, Andre, I had you queued up.

So what are you thinking right now as far as where we're doing? stand so one of the key questions i mean we've seen these huge long liquidations yesterday right and we've seen big outflows as well right from eTS we've seen one of the biggest daily net outflows since i think eight weeks right since two months and so the question is of course a sentiment already oversold right is it excessively bearish i think we still might have some more downside because at least based on our own crypto asset sentiment index, it hasn't really flashed a contrarian buying signal yet, but it looks more and more bearish. So it looks more and more attractive from a risk reward. But I think a bigger question is how do you make sense of all

of these intermarket divergences, right? We've seen continued all-time highs in the S&P 500. we've seen continued new all-time highs and gold, right? But Bitcoin seems to be lagging, right? And I think how to make sense of all of this, right? I think it has to do with the fact that Bitcoin appears to be more sensitive to changes in global growth expectations, while the S&P tends to be more sensitive to monetary policy right now, right? It tends to change all the time, all these macro factors. But if you look at how these divergences have dissolved in the past, it usually tends, so Bitcoin tends to follow the S&P 500 higher, right?

Some people say like, oh, Bitcoin's like the canary and the liquidity coal mine, right? It's like the best barometer of liquidity, which is true, right? But in these cases where we've seen, like new ultramizing the S&P 100 and where Bitcoin was lagging, it usually, yeah, dissolved in favor of, like, new all-time highs and Bitcoin rally. So I'm actually quite optimistic that Bitcoin will follow suit. And we've talked about the reasons why probably thousands of times, right, we've seen Fed rate cuts. It implies an acceleration in global money supply growth and U.S. money supply growth in particular, right?

Yield curve steepening and so on, rising inflation expectations, declining real yields. So I think like the macro picture itself is very, very bullish. And yeah, I think what could lead to this kind of homoeing in of investors into Bitcoin is probably a spike in the ISM. Because, yeah, as I've said, like Bitcoin tends to be more sensitive to global growth expectations and that should spike upwards if you see this kind of spike in the ISM. And I think what's already pointing towards the scenario is earnings revisions.

Like you see these huge upwards positive earnings revisions, right? And they tend to lead the ISM manufacturing index. So I think, yeah, it's just a matter of time before Bitcoin starts really and again, maybe. Yeah, Kobe, you see later had a great tweet yesterday that speaks to this confusion across markets. Here's what it said. Current situation. Number one, stocks are rising like the U.S. economy is soaring. Two, oil prices are falling like we're entering a recession. Three, gold rising like the Fed is cutting rates into inflation. Four, Bitcoin is falling, like Fed rate cuts are postponed. Five, home prices are rising like more rate cuts are coming. Six, treasury yields are

rising like stagflation has arrived. I haven't actually checked the 10 year today, but Wednesday, Thursday, Friday. Yeah, okay, good. Finally, because Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Monday, all four days that it was trading, basically, since the Fed cut rates, it was rising. Yeah, it was rising, but, like, the overall trend was down over the past couple of months, right? So. Yeah, but it speaks to the fact that it was anticipated and dropping, and they make the actual cut and things go up, which has to have your spidey senses tingling after seeing what happened last year when they cut rates, and obviously it did not have much effect on treasuries.

Dave, obviously, can jump in any time. Are you there, Dave? Can you guys hear Dave? I cannot hear Dave. No. Nope. Dave, just drop and we'll obviously bring you back up. So anyone else, market thoughts specifically on where we stand at the moment?

Yeah, I like to share some thoughts. Yeah. So I think since the tariff crash for all markets earlier in a year, I think the timeline has been pushed back. I know people are getting a bit hands. see, you know, September, October, and so forth. But if you look at what took place in the summer, usually it's solid may go away, but we actually had some rallies over the summer, right?

So I think the pullback we're seeing is healthy. Bears are pretty much in control on the weekly Bitcoin chart. So I think we're going to bottom out. Sentiment may go back to fear, and then we'll start ripping again. It's just cyclical. And I think just the timeline has been pushed back. I know people are wondering that if four-year cycle has been broken, I don't think something is just what happened at the beginning of the year

is impacting the timeline now. Can you hear me now, Scott? Can you hear me? Yes, I can. Yep. It's like a sprint commercial. Yeah, yeah. Whatever, I've lost.

Whatever. Anyway, three points now. Point one, as far as fixed income, the tenure, you got to zoom out a bit. once if you look at the yield from the period of time before it became virtual lock there was going to be rate cuts in September i aka the announcement of the revision down at employment until now the yield is lower it was at 4-2 to 4-3 it's now a little bit below that so you know you have to understand it was well telegraphed so the fact that it moved it's sell on the news it's not the same thing this was not a surprise whereas that 50 basis point move was a surprise and people reacted to it. So the reaction to the cut was already normalized in. So I think that's a non-event. It's not a big deal. But what will happen in the future, we'll see. It juries out. Second, as far as technicals know, the last time we saw chart pattern of a major flush with virtually no volatility after regaining 50%

of the flush. This has happened twice before. For those, I'll let the sleuths go into it. But I can tell you, in both cases, it was very bullish because you're seeing the inflows meeting demand and eventually the people who sold end up getting FOMO, blah, blah, blah, blah. So we all know where that's going to go. It doesn't mean it's going to happen. When I say bullish, I mean six weeks later, not six days later, not six hours later.

So just understand that. As far as this four-year cycle nonsense goes, the four-year cycle, there's a political four-year cycle, but we've had the S&P or other asset classes had not had four-year cycles. They have cycles. Bitcoin had a four-year cycle because it used to be that the single biggest demand, that supply driver was mining. It no longer is. It's not even close. Mining is now probably less than 5%, 10% of the supply that's being sold into new demand. So to hold on to these sort of cycles, three of them, I mean three, not 30, but three, to me is silly. It doesn't mean there can't be echoes of it. It doesn't mean no one will care, but it does mean that you can't really, you shouldn't be relying on that on a technical basis. Because if you do, you could literally miss what will be the next big move. Brian. I've been tracking, you know, mining profitability and been doing forward projections based on mining profitability and hardware changes since 12 years ago.

So in 2023, I put together a forward projection based on September's numbers. I had $70,000 for September 24. We were right within the bounds. I had $1.22 for September 2025. once again, I think right in the bounds. But just what Dave was saying, my numbers are actually breaking out of the four-year cycle because 2026 I have at 204 for September. Now, whether it sticks inside my model or not, but the last three years have been pretty good.

So I do see us kind of breaking out in September, 26, is different. Normally we would have a pullback year. How do you model? all this? There's a proprietary and super secret. I mean, it's based on hardware profitability, so hardware efficiency, and then we assume that cost of power is pretty static. There's only so far down you can go through cost of power and then your OPEX.

And then we model out a consistent difficulty increase. So we just assume that we can only pump out hard. hardware so fast and it can only make so many increases in optimizations around hardware. And then we kind of have a solid barrier of how far down we can drive our OPEX. So we just kind of model it out. So I have an optimistic model, a really optimistic model, and an insanely optimistic model. And we've actually been tracking right along the really optimistic model for the last three years. Really optimistic sounds good.

remain that way. I love it. Mark, you jumped up. You have requested to speak. You have any specific comments? I don't. I apologize for jumping in and hitting the mic. I just joined. So let me let me listen in and I'll come back in a second. Thanks. No problem. And we're getting ready to get Dennis up on stage within the next five, 10 minutes. So just so people know that that announcement is coming, we're just waiting for it all to come together in the background as we can continue to run the main show here. Tony, I just saw your mic lifted. Do you have a comment? Actually, it didn't. I don't know. It's the glitchiest platform ever. If anyone who is to anyone who is in the audience and if you've never run a Twitter

spaces, man, you guys have no idea. Nothing ever works on this platform at all. So Dave, what direction do you think we should head here? We got probably about 10 more minutes. Well, I mean, we've covered the main things. It's really everyone cares about the markets. The only other thing I'll say just as a parenthetical side note, if you're expecting volatility, if you want to hear what one of the biggest seasonality effects that exist in Least in traditional markets, today is Rosh Hashanah, which is the first day of the Jewish High holy day periods, that means in 10 days we have Yom Kippur, which is the Jewish high holy days.

And if you don't understand a simple fact of asset management, one very good rule of thumb is that it's not until after Yom Kippur that many, many fund managers start their year-end re-jiggering of their portfolios. A lot of funds have fiscal year-ends at the end of October. And even the ones that are yearly, they start their pre-positioning. That's one of the reasons that October is often a volatile period. But if you're expecting fireworks before then, I mean, it could happen because, you know, crypto is dances to its own drum. But in financial markets, it tends to be the calm before the storm these 10 days.

So just take that with a grain of salt because, as you probably tell, I'm pretty skeptical of most seasonality things. But if that one does tend to matter. And so if you're expecting us that volatility to break out, and by the way, volatility is so freaking low now. It's actually, it's crazy. Despite that liquidity flush, take a look at the 30 and 60 day volatility on Bitmo or Bitcoin. And it's bouncing right around bottoms. That generally is something that the longer that goes, the more the next big move will happen.

So we'll see. But I'm curious what people think. I think Jeff Park had a similar observation. Jeff is a brilliant dude. I've almost had to blacklist him from shows because he makes me sound so dumb and I never know what question to ask next. Jeff is a smart guy and we obviously see markets through a similar lens. But yeah, I mean, it's just it's one of those things that people trying to understand financial markets, it all boils down to supply and demand. And we keep saying, you know, everyone keeps saying who's selling.

Like we had a spaces yesterday where we had a healthy debate between me and a couple of other people. people, different versions of it on whether or not there's paper Bitcoin or the market's being suppressed. And my answer to that is no. No, this seems pretty basic to me, but there are a lot of people who like conspiracy theories and they want to see shadows under the bed. And you know, sometimes they exist. I mean, certainly gold and silver markets at times have been manipulated. There have been billions and fines to prove it. But I don't think that's happening in Bitcoin, although I think the Sunday flush and all coins probably was manipulation. but, you know, who they all knows.

I mean, Bruce, I see you up here. I'm sure your answer to that is, screw it, who cares? Let it be manipulated and the market will punish the bad people and, you know, people will figure shit out. Is that right? Yeah, sort of. I mean, I believe in markets. I'd rather have markets doing it than, you know,

filthy thieving tyrants in Washington, D.C., stealing our money and doing it. It's not like those guys are super honest. You know, the difference is they have all the guns. And they have the legal ability to steal our money by force and threat of force. So, you know, the world has bad people and good people, but we're not just going to magically make all the bad people go away. But what we can do is starve them of stealing our money and giving them a monopoly on force and the ability to throw people in cages over stupidity. And then, you know, you still end up with bad and dishonest people in the public markets who will, you know, do bad. dishonest things, but at least there, you know, you have more of a choice. So, you know,

all else being equal, I'd rather, you know, in a perfect world, we could just erase all bad people and we wouldn't have bad people. But that's sort of fantasy thinking. You know, second, you know, it's right up there with the fantasy idea that, oh, if we just give a monopoly of power and force to these wonderful angels down in Washington, D.C., who steal our money and have all the guns, they'll be wonderful and great and moral and they won't they won't harm us and I think that we've all seen that that doesn't work that's not the case you know they you know they don't stop the problems whether it's whether it's fraud or theft or hacking or whatever they're saying that they're going to stop you know or if it's poverty or crime or whatever you know

the more power we give Washington in the form of regulations it doesn't It doesn't solve. A lot of people have this fallacy like, oh, if we just give them a bunch of power to be tyrants and horrible and throw people in cages, they'll stop all the bad things from happening. But that's not what happens. You give them all this power and they have all of the harm and they steal our money to pay for it. And they don't stop the bad things. They empower people like Sam Bankman-Fried and Bernie Madoff, who was head of one of the largest regulators.

You know, Sam had better access than anyone in our industry. Sam had unprecedented access and he was loved and they still had bills two years after he went to jail. They had bills still floating around. His lobbying power with the money he stole from the people was so powerful that the machine just kept going even after he was in jail. People were still pushing for his stupid laws that he was trying to push, which would have given FTX an advantage. And he had a special meeting with Gensler talking about no action relief. So, you know, the idea that these, you know, tyrant clowns, and that's what they are. They're tyrants.

They steal our money, and their only legitimacy is their ability to use force. We would never listen to these people. Nobody would ever listen to Gary Gensler or any of these clowns in the United States or elsewhere. These people like Lagarde and Jerome Powell, these people are utter clowns. They wouldn't even, they couldn't even go on this spaces. They couldn't even hold their own against any of us because they have nothing to offer. The only thing that they have to offer is the ability to throw people in jail and put people in cages because they've been empowered with this invisible social contract that nobody ever signed. And they have the ability to steal our money to have this giant machine with all the guns and all the jails behind them.

And it's totally illegitimate. It's totally crazy. And yeah, I'd much rather have markets work better. And, you know, sure, we have some bad things with it. But overall, I think markets would work a lot better. Well, I mean, I can't argue with half. of that, but there is half that I will argue with. I mean, there is very little doubt that having a certain scaffolding in the United States

in terms of oversight in attracted and provided confidence to investors such that if you just look at the number of companies that want to list here to access our liquidity and the amount of money that raise and if you compare the equity culture in the U.S. versus the equity culture in Europe where we didn't have the same sort of regulatory clarity in a certain sense. There are certain things such as best execution rules, such as knowing that, you know, that disclosure rules in certain cases. Now, in almost every one of the rules, they've gone overengineered and gone backwards. They've done what you're suggesting.

They've, you know, because you employ thousands of people to write rules, what are they going to do? Well, guess what? They're going to write rules and sometimes they're going to write rules that aren't necessary. What's interesting is we literally today have a head of the SEC and a head of trading in markets who would be nodding if they were standing next to me and we were on a stage. They would say, yeah, you're right. That's exactly what's happened. Now, that is a very big departure from Gary Gensler.

Gary never met anything he didn't think he could control and do better than everybody else. And so, you know, conflating all of them together, that's a bit over a bit of an overestimation. I mean, I see a bunch of people in the audience who know this, who talk to these people. I mean, Eleanor, I don't think, I can't see you look like a listener to me. You talk to these. She's a listener. I try to invite her, but I got denied it, it would seem. Yeah, whatever.

I mean, spaces, but I'm just, you know, we don't have very much time. But I do think it's over-completion. I mean, you know, Gary, you're up here and you have a microphone. We were talking about a lot of this stuff last night. You come from the commodity markets and you've seen the differences. I mean, you know, what's your perspective, right? You know, we had a whole big debate on your, on your spaces yesterday about this. Are you there behind the mic?

Yeah, but not clear on the perspective on what, like, do they're not manipulated or is not, look, manipulations happen. The question is, can regulators make a positive, can they make a positive difference or is it just complete bullshit and we should just let it all roll? I think the markets are going to to determine what happens and the politicians are irrelevant. Okay. That's what I believe. I think markets are. have a way of correcting everything if we just get out the way especially the idiots who've never built anything i don't know if we got cut cut off there bruce were you about to say something we're going to yeah go ahead dave i was going to say i see dennis in the audience but i know if you can bring he's up dennis and dennis is on stage now um i know that we have 8,500

33 people currently waiting to hear what he has to say. So, Dennis, I don't know, do you need a couple more minutes? No, we can jump into it here in just a moment. I also wanted to bring Wendy up that I feel like she's definitely going to have some important things to say for the conversation as well. So I'd love to have her jump up on stage. She's here. I don't know if you see it.

We can't always see who is and is not on stage. But she has a speaker, half the people always shows. listeners, unfortunately. Yeah, okay, great, because, yeah, she's still seen as a listener. So glad to have her up here for this. So I'll get going in just a moment. I have something I'd like to jump into a little bit before I jump into this announcement. Some of the big things here is that, you know, just as a little bit of a disclosure, you know, for some of you that are in this space, you know, might be hearing about me for the very first time. And I want to share a little bit about my work. And then we're going to jump into this announcement. But I'm the

CEO and co-founder Satoshi Action Fund, which is a non-profit that is highly focused on advocating for Bitcoin. What we do is we take ideas and we turn them into law. We have passed nine bills into law in eight different states, including the first ever SBR in history. We've also been very involved in trying to protect Bitcoin rights, including the right to self-custody, the right to run a node, the right to mine, the right to peer-to-peer transactions. But one of the things that's always been very concerning for me, ever since I started working in the space, which is a little over three years ago, actively, of course, because I was a, you know, a podcast host before that was just the bipartisan nature of Bitcoin, the nonpartisan

nature of Bitcoin. In my opinion, we are headed down a very dangerous path with the partisan nature of Bitcoin. And so it's been a big mission of mine for a very, very long time to make sure that both sides work together. I mean, ultimately, you know, I was listening in a little bit earlier. And, you know, the talks about market structure, you know, we can't get market structure done unless we have 60 votes in the Senate. And that's going to require some Democrats coming across the aisle to work with Republicans unless Republicans plan on winning 60 seats in the Senate. And I don't think that's going to happen anytime soon. You know, I've talked a lot to a lot of Senate leaders recently. I have been very actively engaged on market structure. And I do feel

hopeful that we can get something done. I think a lot of people have lost hope on market structure, but I do believe there is a way to thread the needle. And I'm going to be working very aggressively. I have been already working very aggressively in D.C., something I don't talk about a lot, but I have been spending almost all of my time there over the last four months working with predominantly U.S. Senate offices to figure out how we can thread the needle on this and really ultimately bring everyone to the table so that we can address a lot of the concerns that everyone has. So this next announcement that I'm going to be going into is going to be very important for developing the framework that we need to get to a good place on Bitcoin across the political

aisle, across the country. And so I'll go ahead and start up. And Scott, if you want to go ahead and do the next steps too as well. Everybody's on stage who needs to be on stage that you've requested. The mic is really yours. I just want to say very quickly, I appreciate, obviously, you've been teething this large announcement. we actually haven't really known what it is here as well. So looking forward to all the details alongside everyone else,

but very flattered that we were able to have you join and do this here. Obviously, there's a sizable audience and everybody's excited to hear it. So I would just say, take it away. Thank you, Scott. I really appreciate you hosting it. I mean, you did it really without even asking me very many details. So I really appreciate that, giving us your platform to be able to speak about this announcement. So most of you guys know me, and for those of you that hadn't,

I told you a little bit about my work, but for those of you that do, you know me as the guy who passes bills. I've had the honor of ushering nine pro-Bitcoin bills into law, including the first ever strategic Bitcoin Reserve and history. Despite being highly involved in Bitcoin politics, I've stayed away from putting my weight behind specific candidates for a very long time, even though I am very regularly asked to do so. Well, that all changes today. I want to bring to the stage someone I've known longer than most in this space. He isn't just a colleague. I consider him a friend. More importantly, he has been a leader on Bitcoin policy since before it was popular and before it was politically safe. He didn't even do it as a fringe

lawmaker. We see a lot of lawmakers, you know, raising their hands to pro-Bitcoin policy. He did it as the former majority leader of the state of California. Very few candidates in this country have a more impeccable record of standing up for innovation, freedom, and everyday Bitcoin users. But what makes him different isn't just his record. It's his character. At the height of his political career, with immense power at his fingertips, he walked away. He chose family and raising his kids over politics. That decision tells you everything you need to know about who he is and what drives him.

Now he feels compelled to return to public service because he's worried about the future of California and the country, and so am I. He knows the state has drifted away from what it could be and should be. His political thesis is simple but powerful. protect the future, stand up for everyday people, and make California, California again. And yes, show the nation that there are strong Democrats who not only understand Bitcoin, but who are ready to fight for it. This is someone who started working on Bitcoin legislation as far back as 2017. That's when I got into Bitcoin eight years ago.

He was pressing the mayor of San Diego to start a Bitcoin Reserve, telling them that just a million dollars would make them look like geniuses in a few years. and he would have been right if they had bought. He has always been ahead of the curve before many of the biggest names in politics even knew what Bitcoin was. And even after leaving office, he kept working from the outside, helping to pass pro-Bitcoin policy, including a recent bill we worked on together, which is now awaiting a governor's signature in the state of California. I even recently took him to D.C. to meet with lawmakers, all at the federal level.

And I kid you not, the most powerful people in D.C., Even the former Speaker of the House gave him a standing ovation. That's how I knew how influential he was within his own party. That's also where I realized how fortunate I was to be working with him. So on this Tuesday, we don't just launch a campaign. We launch a movement to take back California's future, to prove that leadership is above vision, courage, and sacrifice. I couldn't be prouder to stand with him as he takes this step

and as he makes Bitcoin an absolute centerpiece of his race, ladies and gentlemen, please welcome the former majority leader and the next governor of California, Ian Calderon. Ian, thank you so much for joining us up here on stage today. I really am so proud of the fact that you have decided to throw your hat in the ring and the stage is yours to share your vision for the state of California. Well, Dennis, thank you, buddy. I mean, I don't think I need to say anything.

You said everything that needed to be said, man. That was a great introduction. I really appreciate it. I want to thank everybody for your time, and I want to thank everybody for being a part of this today. Dennis gave you a little bit of my background, but way back in 2010, I decided to run for the assembly. I'd never run for public office before, and I started a campaign. I was 25 years old, and I had a whole bunch of people telling me you're too young, you don't have enough life experience, this isn't something that you could do. And as much as I appreciated, everybody's positive feedback. I decided to move ahead and put the time in. I knocked on about a thousand doors in my district and I won. I won my primary by about 330 votes and then I won the general by about 60% of the vote. And I was the first millennial ever elected to the California legislature. And in 2016, I became the youngest majority leader in the history of the state of California at the age of 30. And I loved what I did. I loved the

this state. I love everything about this state. I love living here. I'm very, very much a proud Californian. But when I ran, my message was really clear that there are decisions that were being made in Sacramento that were impacting our state and specifically my generation and future generations negatively. And I wanted to be a part of that conversation because it was important that that voice be represented. And I did that. I was able to do that for a good amount of time. But because I was young, I got elected at 27. All my major life milestones were also while I was in the legislature. I got engaged. I got married, had my first kids. And I got to a point where I was not with my family. I was not raising my kids and that was bothering me. And in 2020,

I made the decision to leave office because I wanted to be a part of raising my kids. And I was at the height of my power. I was at the height of my influence and I got a lot of comments, well, why would you do that? Why would you leave that? Nobody gives up power when they have it. It's because I never gave a shit about having power. That's what, that's not what was important to me. What was important to me was to be at the table representing a perspective for a generation that I thought was being completely ignored and wasn't important to the people that were making decisions in Sacramento. But I wanted to be a dad more than I wanted to be a politician. I never got into politics with the idea that I was going to be a lifetime politician. And so I left.

I left to raise my kids. And for the last five years, I've been living a wonderful life. I started a business, a successful business. And I've been working that. And I've been doing a lot of work with Dennis continually staying engaged on these policy issues specific to Bitcoin. And, but over the last five years, I've seen life just continue to get harder and continue. you know, there's a vice, and you can just feel that grip getting tighter around you every single year. And recently, my wife and I, my wife Elise, who you'll get to know out on the campaign trail, she's really cool, really amazing. We started having these conversations like, what is our kids' future in this state? You know, when are they going to come to us and say, dad, mom,

I love you guys, but we can't even move out of your house, let alone think about buying something on our own, even though. And the state of California has pretty much told us, you can't, You can't buy a house, you know, the greatest wealth, you know, creation vehicle in the history of California, you know, to pass on that generational wealth, well, that doesn't exist for you. And so we don't have that. We're not going to have the ability to participate in that. And we're not going to have the ability to even start a family because we can't even afford to move out.

So as much as I love you guys, I got to leave. And so the thing that drove me out of the legislature the first time is now the thing that is driving me back. which is my family and my kids. I want them to have a future here, and I don't see that future here in this state. And so I'm jumping back in the race for governor. I think it's time that California has a new generation of leadership,

and this issue area is going to be a huge issue area for me because California has always been a leader on forward-thinking ideas. It's always been a leader on technology, and we have not been leading in this space at all. I can't tell you how frustrated I have been over the last couple of years when I've been screaming at the top of my lungs, do not ignore this community, do not ignore these people. They care about this issue. This is their most important issue. They care about a lot of

things, but this is number one for them. And if you support them, they will support you. Don't turn your back on them. And the party didn't listen. Republicans did. Republicans saw it. And Republicans were able to step in and take advantage of the fact that this is a huge voting block and could see the value of being supportive of these assets and that they weren't going to go anywhere, that this is going to be the future of not just this state but this country. Democrats couldn't see it. And that really upset me. And ever since I can remember I've been on the front line when it comes to this issue area legislating since back 17. So Wendy, I don't know if you guys know Wendy, but she's up here and she's speaking.

with us. She was the very first one to interview me back in 2017 when I authored legislation to create a California blockchain working group to establish, okay, what is blockchain technology and how can we use it to make the state more effective and more efficient? And I've been all in on this issue. I've been all in on Bitcoin since the beginning. And I think that California's future is going to be brighter if we finally do what we should have done from the very beginning and embrace this space, embrace this community, embrace these ideas, and embrace this technology and get serious about what the state of California is going to do to position itself to be a leader on Bitcoin in the coming years. And so that is my motivation as to why I'm running for governor.

And I feel very confident and very good about my chances in being a staying top contender in this race. And so I don't want to talk forever because that's what politicians do is they get up here and they just talk a lot. I want to be able to open it up for dialogue and have people ask some questions. But I really can't think you well enough for jumping in on this. And with me in this race and with your support and your backing, I know that we can make California the undisputed Bitcoin capital of the country. Absolutely. Ian, really thank you for coming up. Really impactful words. And again, I think people need to realize what is taking place right now and why I'm so incredibly excited about what Ian is doing. And keep in mind, like I said,

I do not get behind candidates. I've done it like one time in my entire political career where I've really, really gotten behind a political candidate, and I have not done it since because I have a lot of other work that I need to focus on. But this race is critically important for shifting the dialogue around how both parties, but especially the Democratic Party, views Bitcoin.

And to have Ian be able to jump in this race and be able to make Bitcoin a centerpiece of his campaign is going to shift the dialogue and is going to create a permission structure to enable more Democrats to come out in support of this technology. Just keep in mind also, Gavin Newsom, who's leaving his office to go run for president, is going to be replaced by someone who's extremely pro-Bitcoin, which will give potentially even Gavin Newsom's campaign if he runs for president the ability to speak more strongly about

Bitcoin or at least feel compelled to because his own state is heading towards the Bitcoin future. One of the biggest things that you said to me, Ian, and we've known each other for years. And this is part of the reason why I feel so confident in getting behind you. You know, a lot of candidates ask me to get behind them. A lot of candidates ask me to support them. But I don't know them. I can't trust them, but I can trust you.

One of the things that you had talked a lot about was how you were even pushing the former mayor of San Diego to buy Bitcoin. And also your belief in potentially the state owning Bitcoin. I don't know. Maybe you could talk a little bit more about that. Do you believe that California should establish a strategic Bitcoin? reserve. Yeah, I believe that California should be holding Bitcoin on its balance sheet. So, you know, we have, for all of you, I'm sure you all recognize this, we have a lot of issues when it comes to climate and when it comes to wildfires. And back in 2019, we had passed this

bill that created this wildfire relief fund, which put, you know, there's about $21 billion in it right now, which is a combination of public dollars along with utility dollars, industry dollars to try to backstop the damage that are done by these massive wildfires in the state of California. And it's a big reason that is why we keep losing insurers and providers in this state. It's because these insurance companies, they don't want to take on the liability of knowing that this is something that's going to continue to happen in the state of California and that they don't want to have to be on the hook for it. And so this this reserve, I'm sorry, this fund was established so that we could try to actually help take care of the costs and

rebuild communities as quickly as possible. But the big part of it is that it's just not enough money because you're looking at $10-plus billion in damage when these fires occur. And so two, three major wildfires, which is not unheard of in the state of California at a time, and the fund is completely depleted. And, you know, one of the things that I, what I talk about is that part of a new generation of leadership in California is being able to think outside the box and use, you know, the new technologies and new policies and a new approach to solve for some of these everyday problems. And this is where I feel like Bitcoin really, really steps in and become something that can really help the state of California. And these major issues that are

so important to California voters. And when the voters are polled, you know, wildfire and the threat of wildfire, you know, right behind the cost of living and housing is the most important issue because people are terrified. So the state needs to find a way, a creative way, to be able to bolster that fund. And I think one of the ways that we can do that is by investing that money into Bitcoin. If we had back in 2019 invested that money into Bitcoin,

that money right now that stands at about still, $21 billion, would be worth over $216 billion today. If we had just done half $108 billion today, that you could go to insurers and you could say, hey, guys, look it, We have this fund. We're going to be able to help you backstop you and take care of some of that cost burden when you guys, when there's a massive wildfire and we need to rebuild and rebuild quickly. This could be something that will drive insurers and providers back into the state because they feel confident and comfortable that the state is going to be there to help support them and help these communities rebuild.

you know the the actually our state pension fund just invested some money and it and has already has exposure now to to bitcoin through micro strategy it's not direct i i'm i i self-custody i hold that's what i think the state needs to be doing but the state is already moving closer and closer and closer to actually holding bitcoin on its balance sheet and when i'm governor i'm going to be I'm going to make sure that we hold Bitcoin on our balance sheet because of how important I think it's going to be to the fiscal health and responsibility that we have to our voters of the state. Well, I'm glad I'm really glad to hear you say that because one of the biggest things is we've

needed bipartisan consensus on a strategic Bitcoin Reserve. If you, and by the way, please make sure you follow Ian. Literally, he's launching his campaign with us. I kid you not, we're very fortunate that he decided to launch the campaign with this community. That just shows you how much he cares about Bitcoin and how much he cares about. this space. I'm not joking. One of the major broadcasting stations, Ian can share if he wants about what it's going to happen. But they literally call them and they're like, no, you need to do it with us. You need to do it with us. That's how great of a chance he has of being an absolute frontrunner

and actually winning and becoming the next governor of California. One of the things that you talked about, Ian, was protecting the right to self-custody. We actually worked on that language. So, you guys, the big thing here to keep in mind is that Ian is putting his money where his mouth is. Like even outside the legislature, he was helping me meet chairs of committees and talk to people and engage those lawmakers that he has relationships with. And we got that legislation introduced. It didn't get across the finish line this year, but we were going to continue to work on it. But we did, with his help, get a bill to be able to help the state actually keep digital assets in their native form in the unclaimed property fund, which is a big, big deal. People don't realize how big a deal this is.

But that has actually been passed in the House and the Senate and awaits a government. governor's signature. So even outside the legislature, even outside of his political power, he was working overtime to be able to advance good legislation. So this is not someone who is coming in here to say, hey, look at me, I like Bitcoin, you know, support me. You know I would not get behind a candidate like that. This is someone who has been working on digital asset and Bitcoin legislation since 2017. That's when I got into the space. He was working on this type of legislation. And he continued to do so after giving up all of his power as the former majority leader of the state, but now he's returning because he is deeply concerned about the

future. And we need to make sure and we protect the future and secure the future with Bitcoin in the state of California. But Ian, you said you self-custody or Bitcoin yourself. Talk about how you plan to make your priority to actually protect the right to self-custody. Yeah. So, I mean, just for a little more context in terms of how important this issue is to me and, you know, the significance to me of being here with all of you today on my announcement. You know, I got, I got an offer to do my announcement, not today, but tomorrow with a major news media company live on their show, their morning show. And, you know, the viewership about three people in California. And I said, no, as much as I would love to do that, and I'd still love to have you be my first live on camera interview, I made a commitment to this.

And this is important to me, and I'm going to stick with this. And they were, they were, they were pretty floored that I'd turn them down. They didn't think that they were going to get turned down. And it was not out of, you know, disrespect or that I didn't value who they are and, you know, what they would do and, you know, how beneficial it could be to my campaign. But I made this commitment to be here and to do this announcement Tuesday. And I wasn't going to back out of that. And this issue is too important.

This community is too important to me to have done something like that. And, you know, also going back to what Dana said about putting your money where you're mouth is, you know, back in 2022, you know, my wife and I, we wanted to buy a house for our kids because I left the legislature when we had sold our home in, in L.A. to move down to Orange County, and we were renting in Orange County, and we wanted to buy. And, you know, we kept seeing, we need to make a move because the rate at which the price of housing is increasing in California, if we don't make a new, we're about to get priced out. And so we're, we're going to. we tried really hard. We tried really, really hard to find a home. And, you know, in the district where

we wanted our kids to go to school. And we couldn't get there, unfortunately. And actually, it was even to the point where we were escrow on a house, but we had to back out because of certain circumstances. And what we ended up deciding to do is actually put all of our money that we were going to use to buy a home into Bitcoin and, you know, sell custody of that Bitcoin. And that's what we did. And that's what we have today. And, you know, our thought process, well, maybe down the line, you know, we could use that to buy a home one day for the kids. You know, but my wife, who's a pretty big Bitcoin herself, you know, she's like, I don't want to sell this and I don't want to ever get rid of this. And I'm like, I agree. I want to keep it in Bitcoin. I feel safe.

I feel protected. And this is the only thing that's actually helping us keep up with inflation. And the only thing that we feel is going to be secure enough if, you know, quote unquote, shit hits the fan. So we, we're all in and we're, we're, I'm going to protect the right to self custody because I self custody myself. And it's important for me to have that security of knowing that I have access to this at any point in time. And isn't for any other reason of knowing that I have something that I can count on to be able to protect my family if things go wrong or if there's a major natural disaster. or, you know, whatever the reason may be, this is important to me because I do it. And I know that there are a lot of other families across this state that do the same thing for the same exact reasons. And so we need to make sure that nobody, not the government,

the state, no one infringes on our rights and our ability to be able to hold in self-custody our assets and our Bitcoin. That's incredible. Ian, thank you really. I'm really proud of the fact that we get to work with you and to be able to work on supporting your campaign. I'll personally be donating. I know people might take a little while for you to get to know Ian before you feel good about supporting him financially, but I promise you if you pay attention to his campaign, especially if you're in a state of California, you are going to want to get behind him. I wanted to ask Wendy. Wendy, the reason why I brought Wendy up or why Wendy is jumping in on this

with us is because she has known Ian for a very long time. I thought it was important to give her a moment to either ask a question or maybe just say a few words about Ian, Wendy. Thank you for having me. Congratulations, Ian, on your announcement. And as most of you know, I am born and raised in California in Los Angeles County. And a lot of people don't think California is worth saving me just because of everything that's happened over the last few decades. And I do believe California is worth saving. And I'm very excited that Ian will be running for governor to bring Bitcoin to California. I think there's so many possibilities and so much good that can be done to better California as a whole with Bitcoin,

all the innovation that can happen and just jobs and just everything. It's just such a wonderful, it's just such a wonderful asset. It's completely changed my life. And yes, I have known Ian since about, I want to say, 2018, I interviewed him on my channel, 2019, and I can say that he has been in the Bitcoin space since then. Everything he's saying is accurate. He talked about AB 2658. I believe that's what the bill is.

And he has been working towards different goals regarding Bitcoin since then. And he's not just some candidate that's popping up that is, you know, kind of riding the Bitcoin hype and the Bitcoin train. He actually cares about Bitcoin. He cares about the future of California. And he's put the work in to do so. So again, congratulations, Ian. And I will be supporting this in my own capacity because, again, I'm born and raised in California. and I have a family here.

I want things to be able to be affordable. I want California to lead the United States of America in Bitcoin. Absolutely, yeah. So thank you for everybody who's been tuning in. You know, Ian, I know you're going to have a very busy day with a lot of different media folks. We've been getting outreach from Bloomberg, from other major large organizations, Politico, that want to interview you and get time with you. We're super excited about your race and also really honored that you. you would launch that race here with us.

You know, a lot of people in this space know that the Bitcoin community and the Bitcoin ecosystem has immense political weight behind it now. And, you know, I will say that I'm here to support you. And for some reason, you just went muted for a second. Can you speak? Yeah, go ahead. Yeah, I'm back. Sorry.

I'm going to be working hand in hand with a lot of other Californians to make sure that they have the time to get to know you and to understand why they should support you. So thank you again for popping up. I don't know if you have any last comments. I mean, you could take questions, but I know you're very busy, so I don't want to assume that you're going to willing to take questions from a focus on stage. Yeah, I really, again, just want to thank everybody for your time. You know, this is going to be a marathon.

It's not a sprint. There are some candidates that have been in this race for almost a year. And, you know, I got a lot of catching up to do, but I feel real strong about our position. I feel real strong about our message, and I feel real strong that we're going to be on the right side of history. This is important to me. I wouldn't be doing this if it wasn't important to me. I understand the sacrifices because I've lived this life. I've been in public office.

I know what that means. I know what that entails. And if I didn't truly believe that I could make a difference and do the things that I say I'm going to do, I wouldn't do this because I wouldn't risk the time that I'm going to have to be away from my kids, four kids, the ages eight, six, five, and almost four. I wouldn't be sacrificing that and being able to be with them and take him to school every single day and to jump in this if I didn't believe in my heart of hearts that this could be done that we can change the trajectory of California and make it just be again

the opportunity capital of the world it is the it is the best place to live I love it I love being here you know I love I love everything about this state and my family being able to stay in the state so I care a lot about it and I really appreciate you guys taking the time to listen to me and would love to have your support. Thank you, Ian. And one thing I want to keep in mind here, you know, Ian's definitely the guy to run on a hopeful message. And, you know, I really love to see that in today's modern politics.

But everyone needs to understand what is at Jeopardy right now. The front runner currently today right now for the race for the governor of California is Katie Porter. Katie Porter is one of the most anti-Bitcoin, anti-everything in this space. In fact, she's so anti that when she ran for U.S. Senate, just a couple of years ago, there was incredible money spent against her to stop her from being a U.S. Senator because she is that dangerous to the Bitcoin space. So we really have, you know, two options here. You know, we can let Katie Porter go on and win and turn California

towards an even darker page of history when it comes to Bitcoin, giving more incentive to more Democrats to be against Bitcoin. Or we can get behind a candidate who actually cares about Bitcoin, someone who has proven time and time again that they'll be behind the space, not only through legislation, but as the former majority leader of the state, pushing other lawmakers. Like literally, there were years ago when I was meeting with Ian, just after he had left the legislature, there were, you know, lawmakers, he was telling me stories of lawmakers who were like, we're just going to trust you, Ian, because we know that we can get behind you. And so the potential here is immense.

California, not only is critical state. It's the fourth largest economy in the entire world that could potentially not only be owning Bitcoin, protecting the right to self-custody Bitcoin, but also the California federal delegation, all of the lawmakers that go to Washington, D.C., there are, it's one of the largest delegations. I think it is the largest delegation in the entire country. So as the governor of California, with all of these lawmakers who, again, trust him, like I showed up to D.C. with Ian, brought him in the room. I just thought, you know, maybe a couple people would shake his hand. No joke. The guy stops. The guy up to the member of Congress stops the

whole room and turns towards Ian, and they, like, literally give this guy a standing ovation. I was completely surprised and shocked. You know, you always assume that people might be a little bit popular, but he was very popular amongst that California delegation. Again, the former Speaker of the House was in the room, clapping for Ian. So not only can he influence the direction of California's politics at the state level, he can have a major impact on every single one of those Democrats who serve California and are showing up in Washington, D.C. as lawmakers to push them towards being more supportive of Bitcoin. So when I said that this was important, and some of you might not care, you know, some of you might just love that Republicans are

running away with the show and Democrats are getting beat over the head on this issue. But that is a very dangerous direction that we are headed in. If we head towards a world where one party supports Bitcoin and one party is against Bitcoin, it will be a terrible future for our country. because we will spend every four years or so when the party switch power, we'll spend four years supporting Bitcoin, and then the next party will come in and it will spend four years ripping away all the progress that we have made to pass pro-Bitcoin legislation, potentially putting in jeopardy every single piece of legislation that we are currently working on at the federal level.

And so by Ian coming in and supporting this and winning and becoming the next governor of California, he can pave the way for this issue to be a bipartisan issue so that, yeah, We might disagree on the future of what to do with Bitcoin, but we're fighting over what to do with Bitcoin and not fighting over whether or not we should be doing Bitcoin as a country. And this is a fairly important also for things like a strategic Bitcoin Reserve at the federal level, which really has struggled to gain any sort of bipartisan consensus. There are tons of Republicans behind it. Senator Llamas has done incredible work to put this issue at the forefront of the policy dialogue. But in order to get Democrats on board, there needs to be strong Democrats who get behind it and who support it and who are encouraging their colleagues to get behind it. And that is something that Ian will do, not only as he's running for governor of California, but as the next governor of California as well. So, Ian, really thank you again.

I know you already sort of gave your closing remarks, but I could not more strongly let people know just the direction that could change for the history of Bitcoin. Bitcoin politics will take a massive shift, not only from you announcing this race and getting out there and championing this issue, but also for when you are the next governor of California, people will be able to point to you and listen to you and trust you on this issue. And we could prevent people like Katie Porter from grasping on to the reins of power in California, which would ultimately head us towards a much darker path. Now, I know, again, many of you are meeting Ian for the very first time. I said I'll be financially supporting him. I know a lot of other folks already are, but it'll take time for you to get to know him a little bit. Check out his website. Go to his website right now. It's obviously in his bio. Check out his social media. It's pretty clean, right? He hasn't been talking a lot about politics because literally

he is launching his campaign right now. But you're going to want to follow him. You're going to want to pay attention to the press releases he's putting out, to the social media posts he's putting out. And then eventually, of course, and again, so people understand how campaigns work. When you launch, you launch pretty clean. You talk about the issues that matter to you. But over time on his website, you will see the development of policy issues around Bitcoin and his support for things like protecting the right to self-custody. So you won't see a lot there now. It's just a splash page, but I'll be working hand in hand with his campaign to make sure that Bitcoin is sustained and maintain as a centerpiece of that campaign. So Ian, I don't know if you want to say goodbye,

any last words, but I'll be staying on for just a few more minutes to answer any questions and looking forward to convincing all of you that this is a very important race to get behind. Yeah, I just want to say again, thank you to you, Dennis. Thank you, Wendy, for jumping in and supporting me. I really appreciate it. You were the first one to reach out to me and expose me to this community. I'll never forget that. And Scott, thank you so much, man, for your time and for hosting us today.

And what I will say is just kind of putting a little, you know, dot above the eye on a point that Dennis made when it comes to creating the permission structure across the country, especially for Democrats. It is a thing and it is real and we have an opportunity to do this. If there is a governor, a candidate for governor in the state of California that is gaining traction, that is gaining support, that it is completely embracing this technology and embracing Bitcoin and is continually rising in the polls and is it is a viable contender, which right now we are getting all the different types of intention that we would want and need to be able to determine that viability. Right now as we speak, my phone is blowing up and I'm getting text messages and tweets and everything from all. the right people that need to be talking about this campaign. But the permission structure is a real thing and it will work. And it's going to work because I had a conversation just this past week with a former colleague of mine who is currently serving as a member of Congress. And what he told me is, hey, I got an opponent, DSA opponent, Democratic Socialist of America opponent. And they're hitting me

on being pro-Bitcoin. And I said, well, that's silly. They're not looking at any polls. People, that's actually a good thing. People want their leaders to embrace change and embrace the future. And his response to me, he goes, I know, I don't get it. I think it's stupid, but I think it's great. Keep hitting me on it because I completely support it. And this is somebody that they're not a couple years, just a couple years ago, wouldn't have said that same thing. It wouldn't have had that same position. So this matters. It absolutely matters. And there's a huge opportunity here to completely change the tone and the tide when it comes to Democrats specifically in the support of this issue area. If they can see that I can do it here in California and that I'm going to

to do it here in California, that allows them to feel more confident and comfortable leaning in on their federal level where we really need federal legislation to provide those rules of the road and create consistency across all the states. In a state like California, I've been in a legislature, I'm telling you, this is a hugely, hugely influential state. And a state like California being able to, as a strongly democratic state embracing Bitcoin, it will mean something in Washington, D.C. But thank you guys so much. I really appreciate it. And I'll see you out there. on the campaign trail, guys. Good luck, Ken.

Thanks so much for joining. We appreciate you coming on then. Ian, thank you. Really appreciate it. As a quick follow-up, you know, Ian's going to be jumping off. So I really appreciate him coming up here and launching his campaign with us. You know, if you guys do take the time to get to know him, I can promise you I have for over many years.

You are going to be very confident about supporting him, getting behind his race. I could not more strongly implore you to believe in the future of what, his race can accomplish. You know, at the end of the day, this has become a very partisan issue. There are already voters that are turning against the issue and are voting against lawmakers potentially who support Bitcoin. And so the time is now for us to write the course of history for Bitcoin politics. And there really is not another race in this country that is going to do that. You know, maybe in 2028 we get lucky with a, you know, a Democratic Bitcoin presidential candidate, but already we are seeing multiple presidential hopefuls on the Democratic side of

the aisle espouse their opposition to the space. I pay very close attention to it. I monitor it all the time because it's an issue that's very important to me to keep Bitcoin nonpartisan or bipartisan in nature. And we are headed on a dangerous path. And we need to make sure that we do everything that we can to prevent us from continuing to go that direction. As a couple other big things that are happening in our world. So like I said, I'm very involved in the market structure conversations, very involved in talking to Democrats, Senate Democrats and senators across the political aisle on this issue. If you're very interested in helping to support that, please reach out to me. We are making huge gains in those conversations. As a couple of other

quick notes, for those of you that may want to be a part of one of the most exciting and moan of the most aggressive and successful Bitcoin advocacy groups in the entire country, we are hiring for a Bitcoin, a director of Bitcoin advocacy. So someone will be able to go hand-in-hand work with lawmakers to be able to pass pro-Bitcoin bills into law. We've already done it nine times, and we are not done. We are going to continue to pass Bitcoin rights across the country. We're going to continue to pass strategic Bitcoin reserve bills across the country. In fact, they just had another state official reach out to me recently and say they're ready to introduce that type of policy. We already did it in three states, but we're not done.

We need to keep continuing to move forward. And we also have some other very big stealth projects in the works that I can't wait to get in front of you guys and share more about. There is going to be a lot of announcements that are going to be happening over the coming months and looking forward to working with you guys to make sure that we make Bitcoin a centerpiece of U.S. politics. So I know there were some other folks up here. Scott, I don't know if there was any other comments or questions or if you're just ready to shut the space. I know Wendy has her hand up.

So I know if she has another comment, of course, absolutely. Otherwise, we'll finish it up when you're done. Thank you, Seth, and I'm Dennis. Again, I just want to say, I'm born and raised in California. And it generally is a Democratic state for the most part. And for a very long time, Democrats did not, they did not support Bitcoin. They really didn't understand the power of it, which I thought was crazy. Because when you think about a level playing field, that's what Bitcoin does.

And if this allows for a better quality life of myself, my family, and my community, then I'm all for it. I mean, California is an absolute mess. It's been a mess. And we do need change. So to the people that don't understand how big this is, that's fine. You don't live in California. Most of you don't think California is worth saving.

But really, if you want Bitcoin to become fully embodied into everything American, you're going to need bipartisan support and you're going to have to put your hurt feelings aside and you're going to have to look at things in the bigger picture. So have a wonderful day and God bless America and God bless California. Thank you so much, Wendy. Thank you so much, Dennis, of course. And I know we're going to be hearing a lot more about this, obviously. Hopefully we can keep Ian and other pro-Bitcoin politicians at the 440. especially in this environment where obviously the crypto lobby has absolutely taken over. So, Dennis, I'm sure you're working very hard to make sure that they have his back and that he

will be supported in this race. Katie Porter's disaster. So this is really coming at the right time and the right place. So Dennis, appreciate what you do and you bring a mess here once again. Absolutely. Thank you, Scott. And thank you, everybody, for tuning in. Keep your eyes out for more announcements.

that will be coming, very excited about the future of Bitcoin in this country. We have a chance to really make the United States and states like California, you know, the undisputed leader on Bitcoin for generations to come. You really can't do that without bipartisan consensus. I know Republicans have done a great job of making Bitcoin a centerpiece of their political politics

and their policy, but we need both parties if we're going to be able to continue to make progress. And if we want to make sure that the United States continues to lead, it's going to require getting folks like Ian into office. So thank you again, Scott. I really appreciate you hosting us. Thank you everybody for tuning in. And I'll certainly be hopping around to some different shows and different spaces later today. So keep an eye out for those as well. Thanks so much, Dennis, which is I was trying to change the title and I botched it in the

while I'll try to do it. So we are going to wrap. I'm going to go ahead and do that while because it will get stuck. There we go, Ian Calderon. So you guys get to see you guys get to see the drama of X spaces in real time. That's what we got, guys. We will be back obviously tomorrow. Thanks once again, Dennis. We'll see you guys tomorrow. Have a good one. Bye. Thank you.