Crypto's presence in Washington, D.C., has come a long, long way. A decade ago, the industry stood up an early advocacy group called the Bitcoin Foundation that lined up a handful of meetings before (surprise, surprise) collapsing in scandal. Today, the crypto world is a fixture in the capital and has the cash to flex in the highest corridors of power—an influence set to grow after the industry gave $78 million to a trio of super PACs.
Super PACs are basically advocacy groups on steroids that spend heavily to promote a given candidate or issue. In the case of the crypto super PACs, which are funded by the likes of Coinbase and Andreessen Horowitz, they will use a big chunk of their money to back those running for Congress and other political positions. The big question is who will be eligible to receive the donations.
If history is any indication, the crypto industry will back any politician who likes Bitcoin—even if they are awful in every other respect. This includes El Salvador's thuggish president as well as the GOP presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, who has floated the idea that the Jan. 6 riots and 9/11 terrorist attacks were inside jobs. Then there is Democratic crank Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who likes to peddle conspiracies about vaccines causing autism or how COVID-19 was secretly designed to spare Jews and Chinese people. You get the idea.
Crypto types like to proclaim lofty ideas about freedom and democracy, and wresting power from a corrupt and inefficient state. Yet, time and again, the industry's leading figures will rush to throw their support to kooks like Kennedy or cynical demagogues like Ramaswamy who have no serious plan for governing. One can only wish prominent crypto figures spent a little more time reading the likes of Hobbes and Madison rather than huffing social media for political inspiration.
The other problem with the crypto industry's "anyone who likes Bitcoin" strategy is it's a recipe for squandering money on fringe candidates who have no hope on getting elected. A better strategy would be to tweak this to "any electable candidate" who likes Bitcoin—and, fortunately, there are more of those every year on both sides of the aisle.
The crypto industry's new big-money campaign can succeed because its underlying message is a just one: Rather than allowing a faction of Elizabeth Warren-led fanatics try to kill crypto, our political leaders should be working to keep blockchain jobs and technology on U.S. shores. There is a big opportunity right now for the industry to make real progress in the 2024 election—provided it doesn't torch its money on garbage candidates.
Jeff John Roberts
jeff.roberts@fortune.com
@jeffjohnroberts
