The shitcoin presidency
$TRUMP is taking corruption to new levels.
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Donald Trump declared on the campaign trail that he’d be a “crypto president” during his second term. He said he’d make America “the crypto capital of the planet” and a “bitcoin superpower.” His sudden and wholehearted embrace of cryptocurrency thrilled the industry, but just days before taking office, Trump surprised his crypto supporters with a cash grab that’s shameless even by his standards.
Last Friday, Trump announced on his Truth Social platform that he’d launched his own “memecoin” bearing the name $TRUMP.
“My NEW Official Trump Meme is HERE!” he wrote. “It’s time to celebrate everything we stand for: WINNING! Join my very special Trump community. GET YOUR $TRUMP Now. Go to gettrumemes.com — Have Fun!”
It might’ve seemed like grandpa’s account had been hacked, but it’s actually yet another example of Trump’s ongoing long con on the American people. Since the election, he’s sold $199 Trump cologne and $100,000 Trump watches. Now, he’s hawking digital magic beans.
By Sunday morning, the $TRUMP coin had exploded in value. According to Axios’s Felix Salmon, the coin had made Trump $56.6 billion on paper, accounting for roughly 89 percent of his total net worth.
First Lady Melania Trump got in on the grift on Sunday with her own $MELANIA memecoin, which also generated billions of unearned dollars. Melania’s memecoin, however, did some damage to $TRUMP.
$MELANIA’s launch diverted attention and liquidity from Trump’s memecoin, which dropped from a $75 high on Sunday to $40 on Monday afternoon. But hey, that’s still a pretty good price for absolutely nothing.
The Trump family used the presidency to enrich themselves in egregiously corrupt ways the first time around, but the memecoin stunt suggests that owning a hotel by the White House and forcing the Secret Service to spend at Trump properties will soon seem quaint.
A reporter brought up the memecoin during Trump’s Tuesday press conference and asked the new president if he intends “to keep selling products that benefit yourself personally while you’re president.” Trump initially tried to dodge.
“I heard it was very successful. I haven’t checked it. Where is it today?” he said.
“You made a lot of money, sir,” the reporter replied.
“How much?
“Several billion dollars it seems like in the last several days,” said the reporter.
“That’s peanuts for these guys,” Trump quipped, gesturing at the tech billionaires behind him, as if that’s a defense of his corruption. (Watch below.)
Trump didn’t want to say so directly, but he clearly does intend to keep profiting off the presidency. The memecoin opens the door to institutions and even foreign governments lining his pockets without any public accountability.
This level of self-dealing would’ve been unfathomable for a president as recently as a decade ago. Now, however, it’s just another form of misconduct Republicans are doing their damndest to normalize.
What the hell is a memecoin?
Memecoins are a merger of two digital fads — memes and cryptocurrencies.
“Memes” are recognizable images, usually paired with a clever caption, that spread across the internet (for example, the distracted boyfriend). A cryptocurrency is a digital “money-like asset” that doesn’t require any centralized authority, such as a bank or the government, to oversee or maintain.
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Although released and traded on the public market like a stock, a memecoin isn’t really worth anything in itself. They are effectively vibes-based digital “gambles” on popular trends or personalities. Last December, Haliey Welch — the “hawk tuah” girl — launched her own memecoin. It quickly surged to a market cap of $490 million before plummeting in value within hours. It’s essentially worthless now, and many investors lost thousands of dollars. Welch was later sued for damages and accused of “rug-pulling,” a term used to describe a scam where developers intentionally abandon a product, leaving investors holding the bag. (There are reportedly some anti-rug-pull safeguards in place for the Trump memecoin.)
UK-based memecoin trader Sam Baker admitted to The Guardian that memecoins have “no intrinsic value” and there’s no “rhyme or reason” behind their success. Influencers simply inflate their value on social media like digital hot air balloons before they inevitably pop.
It’s depressing but not at all shocking that Trump and the first lady would participate in the same business enterprise as “hawk tuah.” But it isn’t just liberals calling out Trump. Dave Portnoy, founder of Barstool Sports and one of the most influential Trump supporters among young men, posted a damning criticism Saturday on X.
“I have a dumb 2 part question,” he wrote. “1. What’s the difference between the Hawk Tuah coin and the Trump coin besides nothing? 2. Can I string up my own coin now and tell people it’s a Ponzi scheme from the jump and I’m gonna rug pull at some point and you better just hope you’re out when I do it and that would make the entire thing legal?”
Trump himself was once not that far removed from Portnoy’s position. During his first presidency, he called bitcoin, the gold standard of cryptocurrencies, a “scam.” Trump tweeted in 2019, “I am not a fan of Bitcoin and other Cryptocurrencies, which are not money, and whose value is highly volatile and based on thin air.”
But after he left office, Trump made a rapid shift from crypto-skeptic to crypto-grifter.
A financial disclosure from August 2023 revealed Trump had invested in cryptocurrency. This was connected to a “limited edition collection” of non-fungible tokens, or NFTs, he’d released the previous year. The cartoon-like Trump trading cards quickly sold out, although the proceeds were chump change compared to what he’s raking in now.
These days, Trump is friendlier to the crypto industry. He attributes this new position to his two eldest sons, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump.
“I think my children opened my eyes more than anything else,” Trump said last September. “Crypto is one of those things we have to do. Whether we like it or not, we have to do it.”
New frontiers of flimflam
During the 2024 campaign, Trump gained the crypto industry’s favor with positions that sharply contrasted with Biden’s. He promised a crypto-friendly administration that would cut regulations. He said he’d remove SEC Chair Gary Gensler, considered a foe of the industry, and vowed to create a “crypto council” with as many as 20 members who would advise his administration on crypto-beneficial policies. Politico declared just days after Election Day, "The return of President-elect Donald Trump and a potential GOP Congress are delivering a dream-come-true scenario for crypto executives and investors who spent more than $130 million on the 2024 elections."
Beneficiaries include Trump and his family. Don Jr. and Eric Trump are launching their own crypto company, World Liberty Financial. The Trumps pumped up the secretive digital currency platform throughout the 2024 campaign.
Don Jr. tweeted on Sunday, "We are all extremely proud of what we continue to accomplish in crypto. $TRUMP is currently the hottest digital meme on earth, and I truly believe that World Liberty Fi. will revolutionize DeFi/Cefi and will be the future of finance. We are just getting started.”
The Trump memecoins represent perhaps the most blatantly corrupt cash-grab in presidential history, but you wouldn’t know that from paying attention to a cowed mainstream press. CNBC went as far as to scamwash the grift during a Squawk Box segment that made it seem like a perfectly normal thing for a president to it. (Watch below.)
Despite such normalization efforts, prominent crypto executives and investors would prefer if Trump boosted their industry behind closed doors. They rightly fear a damaging backlash.
Ryan Selkis, a Trump supporter and founder of cryptocurrency research firm Messari, tweeted, “Please fire whoever recommended going forward with the Melania launch today. 1. They don’t know what they’re doing. 2. They cost you a lot of $ and goodwill. 3. They don’t have your interests in mind.”
The Constitution’s emoluments clause is supposed to prohibits federal officeholders from receiving payments from foreign governments, but Trump pointed and laughed at it during his first term. House Democrats released evidence last year that showed Trump accepted at least $7.8 million from 20 foreign governments. He insisted the foreign entities freely paid millions for the pleasure of staying at his hotels, with no expectation of quid-pro-quo. That spin always strained credulity, but Trump’s crypto offering frees foreign governments from the hassle of pretense. They can give money directly to him when they buy his latest memecoin, no laundering needed.
Trump’s corruption is usually hidden in plain sight, but the $TRUMP coin is perhaps a grift too far. His shameless promotion of digital products sometimes referred to as “shitcoins” is drawing the wrong sort of attention.
Software engineer and reporter Molly White, citing social media posts from prominent voices in crypto world, observed that “there’s now a fear that people who are not super familiar with this industry will see it as a cash grab and not see all the good uses of crypto that exist. They worry this will give crypto a bad name.”
It’s doubtful that Trump cares. As always, he’s happy to bleed suckers dry, even if they happen to be his most loyal supporters.
Nic Carter, a general partner at crypto-focused VC firm Castle Island Ventures, celebrated Trump’s victory in November as a “relief” for his industry. But now he’s singing a different tune.
“Call me old fashioned but I think presidents should focus on running the country and not launching scam tokens,” he posted on Sunday.
Carter sentiment isn’t “old fashioned” as much as it is hopelessly naive. Trump wasn’t going to help crypto thrive without taking a taste for himself. Launching a grift that stuffs his pockets is entirely consistent with his governing philosophy.
That’s it for today
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"Trump surprised his crypto supporters with a cash grab that’s shameless even by his standards." I am going to point out that there is no standard of shame for Trump, and Trump is shameless.
I have 2 things to say about this.
1) Trump's main purpose for being in the White House, is to become the richest man in the world. This desire is probably intensified by hanging out with the Broligarchy now, and I am certain that he wants to be wealthier than Musk or Putin, and perhaps wealthier than them together. I am sure he wants to be the first trillionaire. He might want to stay out of prison, but that is secondary to his desire for wealth, as a sign of being the best.
2) Trump also likes crypto because it is dark money and as such he can hide who is investing in his endless grifting products from guns, to watches, to bibles, to crypto coin memes, to selling our military as a mercenary army, or selling our intel as soon as his people get their grubby hands on it.
The more I read from trusted writers, the more hopeless I feel about the future. How can we fight back against a greedy autocrat who is supported by the oligarchy, the media and the judicial system? Nothing thar is said to refute his lies is ever heard by his MAGA supporters, and his wealthy supporters are thrilled with his actions and words. Hard to continue being optimistic about anything. Sorry.