Defend Am Jobs Sprpac

DEM PRIMARY EG SCHIFF

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[### Crypto industry amasses colossal war chest for elections

Politico

https://www.politico.com › news › 2025/07/15 › crypto...](https://www.politico.com/news/2025/07/15/crypto-super-pacs-war-chest-key-house-votes-00452356)

1 day ago — Since the 2024 campaign ended, crypto firms have doubled down: The PAC network has raised $109 million since Election Day. The latest ...

A super PAC group funded by cryptocurrency companies will enter the upcoming midterm elections with more than $140 million in the bank, according to new fundraising data shared first with POLITICO — a mammoth sum that now looms large over an effort to pass industry-friendly legislation in the House this week.

The group, known as Fairshake, raised $52 million in the first half of 2025, piling onto an already huge sum of crypto campaign cash that could be wielded against lawmakers who oppose the industry’s Capitol Hill agenda — and boost the political fortunes of those who support it.

The PAC network’s fundraising highlights how top crypto firms are plowing ahead with a lobbying strategy that overtly uses political spending to get their way from Congress. The group includes three affiliated super PACs — Fairshake, Protect Progress and Defend American Jobs — that collectively spent $135 million supporting industry allies and taking down crypto critics in Congressional races across the country last year.

Spending by the group in the 2024 campaigns helped take down key roadblocks to the industry’s policy agenda, including former Senate Banking Chair Sherrod Brown, who lost his Ohio re-election campaign to Republican Bernie Moreno — a crypto enthusiast who benefited from more than $40 million of crypto PAC spending. The PACs also boosted industry supporters in dozens of other House and Senate races across the country, including the California Democratic Senate primary and hotly-contested House races in Alabama, Arizona and Virginia.

Since the 2024 campaign ended, crypto firms have doubled down: The PAC network has raised $109 million since Election Day. The latest fundraising haul comes as the House is preparing to take up landmark crypto legislation this week that would help legitimize digital assets as mainstream financial products and craft bespoke new rules governing the sector.

“Fairshake is stronger than ever as we remain focused on our mission of building lasting support for crypto and blockchain innovation,” said Josh Vlasto, spokesperson for the PAC group. “We are building an aggressive, targeted strategy for next year to ensure that pro-crypto voices are heard in key races across the country.”

The PAC is primarily funded by three companies: the venture capital giant Andreessen Horowitz, which invests heavily in digital asset startups, and the crypto firms Coinbase and Ripple.

Fairshake’s latest fundraising haul includes $25 million donated by Coinbase, the largest U.S. crypto exchange, along with previously announced contributions from Ripple Labs, Uniswap Labs, and the crypto entrepreneur Robert Leshner.

Coinbase’s chief policy officer, Faryar Shirzad, said in a statement that “crypto is already woven into America’s financial fabric,” and the company is “committed to fighting for the consumer protections and financial empowerment” that digital asset owners “deserve.”

The top Washington priority for the group’s top donors is a GOP-led crypto market structure bill expected to go to the House floor on Wednesday that seeks to create a first-ever crypto regulatory regime by divvying up oversight of digital assets between securities and commodities regulators.

Republicans leading the push for that bill are seeking to win over as many Democrats as they can ahead of the floor vote in order to show that the measure has political viability in the Senate, where bipartisan support is needed to clear a 60-vote threshold. A similar GOP-led proposal passed the House with 71 Democratic votes last year — as Fairshake was beginning to ramp up for the 2024 campaign — but concerns over the Trump family’s business entanglements in crypto may make matching that figure difficult this week.

Some Democrats are considering voting against the sweeping market structure measure but supporting a second, narrower crypto bill affecting so-called stablecoins that the House is expected to send to President Donald Trump’s desk on Thursday.

The crypto super PACs, though, have signaled that the vote breakdown on the broader bill, led by House Financial Services Chair French Hill (R-Ark.), will be their primary consideration as they weigh how to deploy their 2026 haul. The group spent more than $30 million benefiting House Democrats during the last campaign.

A non-profit dark money group that is affiliated with the Fairshake PACs called the Cedar Innovation Foundation said in a statement Monday that Hill’s so-called CLARITY Act is “the most important vote members will take this Congress.”

// Trump Border Czar Tom Homan: ‘There Will Be No Amnesty’ | The Conversation

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YIKES 2024

COMMON DR

Crypto Industry's $40 Million Defeat of Pro-Worker Sherrod Brown Called 'Obscene'

The Ohio Democrat lost his seat because "the billionaire-backed crypto industry donated $40 million to his right-wing opponent," lamented one labor journalist.

Jake Johnson

Nov 07, 2024

The Republican Party's capture of the U.S. Senate this week was made possible in part by massive spending from the nascent but increasingly influential cryptocurrency industry, which pumped more than $40 million into a successful effort to topple pro-worker progressive Sen. Sherrod Brown in favor of luxury car dealer Bernie Moreno.

Crypto industry spending helped make Ohio's closely watched Senate race the most expensive in the state's history, with Moreno's campaign boosted by around $40.1 million from the super PAC Defend American Jobs—part of what OpenSecrets described as the "triad" of allied pro-crypto groups pouring cash into the 2024 election.

The Washington Postnoted that Moreno "founded a blockchain firm called Ownum in 2018" and "has long immersed himself in blockchain technology, a registry of ownership that essentially underpins all cryptocurrency."

A spokesman for Fairshake, another member of the crypto PAC triad, took credit for Moreno's victory in a statement after the election was called in the Republican's favor and condemned Brown's support for regulating the industry. Fairshake received tens of millions of dollars in donations from the cryptocurrency exchange giant Coinbase—some of which may have been illegal spending, according to the watchdog group Public Citizen, given that the company is a federal contractor.

"Sherrod Brown was a top opponent of cryptocurrency and thanks to our efforts, he will be leaving the Senate," said Fairshake's Josh Vlasto. "Senator-elect Moreno's come-from-behind win shows that Ohio voters want a leader who prioritizes innovation."

Crypto executive Tyler Winklevoss boasted in a social media post, "The crypto army is striking!"

"Sherrod Brown—crypto public enemy, Elizabeth Warren co-conspirator, and Gary Gensler crony—was just ousted by Bernie Moreno for Ohio Senate," wrote Winklevoss, the co-founder of Gemini.

Labor reporter Steven Greenhouse wrote Wednesday that it is "obscene" that Brown lost his seat because "the billionaire-backed crypto industry donated $40 million to his right-wing opponent."

"Sherrod Brown is one of the most pro-worker, pro-middle-class members of the U.S. Senate," Greenhouse added. "He truly fights for workers."

"The strategy was a brazen attempt to buy influence while keeping the public unaware of what they were supporting."

While the Ohio Senate contest was "the biggest single target of crypto money this cycle," as CNBCput it, the industry spread its money widely, backing both Republicans and Democrats in races across the country—underscoring its attempt to gain influence over future regulatory fights in Congress.

Overall, crypto groups spent more than $130 million in support of candidates for federal office this cycle. A tracker created by the Stand With Crypto Alliance estimates that 263 "pro-crypto candidates" were elected to the House and 18 to the Senate in Tuesday's contest.

Former President Donald Trump's victory over Vice President Kamala Harris was also seen as a win for the industry, with Bitcoin's price spiking to a new all-time high on Wednesday. During his campaign, Trump vowed to make the U.S. "the crypto capital of the planet."

"Tonight the crypto voter has spoken decisively—across party lines and in key races across the country," gushed Brian Armstrong, the CEO of Coinbase. "Americans disproportionately care about crypto and want clear rules of the road for digital assets. We look forward to working with the new Congress to deliver it."

But one critic, Better Markets president Dennis Kelleher, cast doubt on the industry's self-serving narrative that the 2024 results amounted to a ringing endorsement of cryptocurrency.

In an op-ed for the San Francisco Chronicle on Thursday, Kelleher pointed out that pro-crypto PACs adopted "generic anodyne names" and bankrolled.

"It's as if Ford ran an ad campaign and never mentioned its cars," Kelleher wrote. "The strategy was a brazen attempt to buy influence while keeping the public unaware of what they were supporting. This way, the industry can claim the now-elected officials they backed have a mandate from the public to support crypto interests—even though they don't."

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the end of 2023 was not a great time for the crypto industry. In November, Sam Bankman-Fried, the founder of the FTX cryptocurrency exchange, learned that no amount of Michael Lewis gymnastics could save him from being convicted on seven charges of fraud and conspiracy. He was eventually sentenced to 25 years in prison after disappearing $11 billion of other people’s money. The following month, Sen. Elizabeth Warren sent letters to three crypto industry giants, the Blockchain Association, Coin Center, and Coinbase, criticizing them for undermining efforts to rein in crypto’s use in terrorist financing.

Around the same time, crypto groups began making noises about spending money in 2024 to defeat Ohio Sen. Sherrod Brown, the current chairman of the Senate Banking Committee. Brown is a profound skeptic of the industry and signed off on Warren holding hearings on crypto’s possible links to terrorism. Asked about the threats, Brown, a mop-topped Democrat with a raspy voice and wry sense of humor, said he was unconcerned.

“Bring ’em on,” he told reporters, according to Politico. “They’ve had a bad six months. They clearly have betrayed the public interest. If they think that’s the way to attack someone politically? Pretty amazing.”

Brown had no idea.

Rolling Stone has learned that crypto interests are set to spend $32 million on TV ads promoting Bernie Moreno, Brown’s Republican opponent, by the end of September, according to Democratic media buyers. The spending began on August 22 — meaning the crypto interests are spending more than $800,000 per day to flip the Ohio Senate seat, and potentially control of the Senate.

“Outside groups are spending record amounts to try to defeat Sherrod because they know he will always fight for Ohio, not special interests,” said Reeves Oyster, a Brown campaign spokesperson.

So far, the ads have been primarily fluffy positive spots boosting Moreno; some of the spots fearmonger about immigrants and China.

Tracing the roots of Defend American Jobs can be as convoluted as tracing crypto currency itself. The group is effectively a subsidiary of Fairshake — the second-largest fundraiser among Super PACs this season according to OpenSecrets, with over $200 million in its coffers. The bulk of Fairshake’s money has been donated by three crypto monoliths: Coinbase, Andreessen Horowitz, and Ripple.

Coinbase and its affiliates have donated $86 million. The founders of the venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz have together given $44 million. Ripple has contributed $25 million. (The Winklevoss Twins, who donated nearly $5 million to Fairshake, previously tried to donate $1 million in bitcoin to Donald Trump — well beyond what is legal.)

Most of the money raised by Defend American Jobs has come through Fairshake. Coinbase, Ripple Labs, and the founders of Andreessen Horowitz have donated separately, too.

Coinbase’s CEO Brian Armstrong has led the latest charge to bring crypto into the political mainstream, hosting a Super Tuesday rally with Nas in Los Angeles where he proclaimed, “More Americans own crypto than own electric vehicles or are in a union — yet some people in D.C. are still underestimating how much and how many people care about crypto. In 2024, it will become clear that being anti-crypto is bad politics.”

Rep. Katie Porter found that out the hard way. During the California Democratic Senate primary, Fairshake spent over $10 million against her campaign, apparently because she had the temerity to question the energy uses of the industry. Porter didn’t make the runoff, losing to Adam Schiff, a longtime collaborator with crypto who received an ‘A’ rating from Stand With Crypto, a self-described grassroots advocacy hub nonprofit led by Coinbase and fronted by Armstrong. Porter got an ‘F.’

Defend Am Jobs Sprpac

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