The small but vocal Crypto4Harris crowd is giddy right now: Kamala Harris has now twice acknowledged “digital assets” on the campaign trail, billionaire Harris campaign surrogate Mark Cuban has given its cause a boost on the airwaves and the aggressive crypto regulator, Securities and Exchange Commission chair, Gary Gensler, got dragged in a bipartisan manner during a Congressional hearing last week.
Coconut-pilled crypto heads are interpreting Harris’ and top Democrats’ recent comments as more than just politics. Instead they see them as a wink and nod that the campaign is planning to reject the Biden administration’s approach — even if they can’t publicly say so right now.
“I don’t think the Biden admin cared one or another about crypto. The Harris team has been agressive[ly] seeking out meetings with the industry and actually listening.” Cuban told NOTUS via email. “Which led to her mentions of digital assets and blockchain.”
Unlike official campaign affinity groups, Crypto4Harris was formed with a larger goal than just promoting Harris over Donald Trump to crypto lovers. Their aim: convince Harris to make a massive — and somewhat politically risky — 180-degree turn away from the last four years of legal intervention and proactive regulation.
They, like Cuban, think the pressure is working.
“Let’s use our resources to, as we’re helping her get elected, advocate for better policy, while putting out this olive branch because we want the Democrats to come around on this issue,” Crypto4Harris organizer G Clay Miller told NOTUS.
Trump has made crypto a central part of his campaign, and the industry is pouring millions into elections this cycle. Crypto industry funds make up the largest share of corporate spending this election cycle, according to the progressive advocacy group Public Citizen. The largest crypto industry fund, Fairshake PAC, has spent more than $132 million in down-ballot races — including against progressive Reps. Jamaal Bowman and Cori Bush in their primaries.
All the pro-Harris crypto leaders who talked to NOTUS acknowledged that Trump has garnered far more vocal and financial support from the industry, attributing it to the distrust built up over the last four years. But, they argue, it’s no riskier to believe Harris will pivot from Biden’s position than to trust Trump’s crypto skeptic-to-convert tale — he went from calling Bitcoin a scam on Fox News three years ago to promoting his sons’ crypto venture last month.
“She can lean into blockchain and digital assets as a matter of innovation, she has literally spoken that from her own mouth,” crypto advocate and Harris supporter Tonya M. Evans told NOTUS. “I think that is the proof of pivot, and that’s probably all we’re going to get other than her surrounding herself at the senior level, leadership level with others who have a pro-crypto background.”
Miller says he’s been able to see the progression with Democrats over the last few months. It started with Sen. Chuck Schumer attending a Crypto4Harris town hall in August. Then Rep. Maxine Waters, ranking member of the House Financial Services Committee and longtime crypto skeptic, signaled a potential shift in her thinking at the Democratic National Committee. Then Harris herself talked about crypto at a Wall Street fundraiser last month. All of that culminated in Harris’ announcement last week that she’ll “encourage innovative technologies like AI and digital assets,” in her economic policy platform — the biggest win so far for the Crypto4Harris crowd.
Cuban spoke to crypto founder Farokh Sarmad, who has interviewed Trump at Mar-a-Lago, this week on a podcast in an attempt to assure crypto-loving Harris skeptics. Harris, he said, is just being respectful to Biden by not coming out too strong for crypto, but she will bring a sharp departure if elected.
“When Kamala took over as the nominee, it just went a whole different direction. And she had to walk a tightrope, you know you don’t throw your old boss under the bus,” he said.
Cuban has publicly gone after Gensler, the perceived enemy number one among crypto leaders, telling reporters on a call after Harris’ Wall Street fundraiser: “The open sore is what happens at the SEC and she hadn’t said anything in support of the SEC head, so I take that as a positive.”
On CNBC last week, he reiterated: “She’s been very clear about the fact that she’s against regulation via litigation, she’s said it, she’s had me say it for them.” When asked if that’s a “veiled way of saying Gary Gensler is legislating through lawsuits,” Cuban responded: “I don’t think it’s very veiled at all.” (Cuban was rumored to have tossed his name in the running for SEC chair, but told Sarmad that it wasn’t a real possibility, just a way to send a message to Gensler.)
Some close watchers loop Gensler in with Federal Trade Commission chair, Lina Khan, and Department of Justice antitrust head, Jonathan Kanter, as part of the Biden administration’s larger shift toward proactive government regulation and intervention in free markets championed by progressive Democrats and some populist Republicans.
Gensler’s term doesn’t end until 2026, and although the SEC chair typically steps down with a new administration, there is no recent precedent for whether a chair would do so under an administration from the same party. It could be politically complicated for Harris to try to replace Gensler with a regulator friendlier to the industry — one of the crypto crowd’s biggest hopes.
“Are they actually willing to spend the capital to create all this intraparty conflict for the Harris-Walz administration to systematically dismantle the legacy of the Biden-Harris administration?” former Elizabeth Warren chief of staff Dan Geldon said to NOTUS.
Defenders say Gensler’s crackdown on crypto mirrors actions by state regulators, and that Trump’s promise to fire him and the Crypto4Harris crowd’s insistence that he’s getting ousted is advancing other corporate interests that harm consumers.
“This narrative is convenient for a set of other actors outside the [crypto] industry who are also unhappy with chair Gensler for effectively applying the law,” Mark Hays, a senior policy analyst at Americans for Financial Reform, told NOTUS.
The SEC and the Harris campaign did not comment for this article. But Cuban told NOTUS: “With all the abuse Gensler has taken, and rightfully so, you haven’t heard anyone say a positive word in support of him.”
The pro-crypto, pro-Harris crowd is taking the campaign’s silence on Gensler as a signal in their favor — even as they push for more concrete commitment that Harris is not just playing politics with crypto. “If you’re going to shift and pivot, then the details of the policy need to be made clear,” Women in Crypto founder, Amanda Wick, told NOTUS. “To not provide the ‘meat’ of what the crypto policy would look like, you are asking for a lot of trust after the last four years. And voters need more than ‘trust us’ when they are at the ballot box.”
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Claire Heddles is a reporter at NOTUS and an Allbritton Journalism Institute fellow.