Bitcoin Magazine
Democrats to Target Trump’s Crypto Ventures After Taking Congress
House Democrats plan to open investigations into President Donald Trump’s family crypto businesses once they take control in January, with World Liberty Financial, its Emirati investor and the pardon of Binance founder Changpeng Zhao at the top of the list.
Rep. Robert Garcia of California, who will chair the House Oversight Committee, answered the Associated Press call with a two-word statement at 3:18 a.m.: “Lawyer up.” His office said he intends to take on what it calls the “Trump Crime Family” alongside corporate corruption, immigration enforcement abuses and the Epstein files.
Garcia told Punchbowl News the committee will examine the family’s crypto deals, Donald Trump Jr.’s business dealings and relatives such as Jared Kushner “sitting on boards and getting contracts.”
The difference from the past two years is subpoena power. Democrats have written letters, requested Treasury probes and held shadow hearings; the majority lets them compel documents and testimony from the administration and from private companies without the president’s consent.
Reuters reported in September that inquiries could begin as early as February, with corporate donors to the White House ballroom and firms that did deals with Trump relatives among the first targets.
World Liberty Financial, the DeFi and stablecoin venture the Trump family launched in September 2024, is expected to come first. Democrats have focused on a $500 million investment by Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the UAE national security adviser, whose vehicle took a reported 49% stake shortly before the January 2025 inauguration.
The stake matters because World Liberty is seeking a federal trust bank charter for its USD1 stablecoin; the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency granted conditional approval on Aug. 14, with final sign-off pending. Tahnoon’s group and a Trump-affiliated entity together control about 87% of the bank’s holding company, according to The Wall Street Journal.
House Democrats asked Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent in February to investigate the deal and sought suspicious activity reports tied to the family’s ventures. Those requests carried no legal force. Senate Democrats on the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, led by Richard Blumenthal, opened their own inquiry into the TRUMP token and World Liberty earlier this year.
The second target is the October 2025 pardon of Zhao, whose exchange helped launch USD1 and was hacked for $6.34 billion last week. Zhao has said he has no business ties to the Trump family and did not discuss clemency with them. Trump’s 2025 financial disclosure listed more than $1 billion in crypto-related income, including about $635 million in TRUMP memecoin royalties; Reuters put the family’s crypto earnings at $2.3 billion or more.
What the Trump probes can and cannot do
The investigations will not produce legislation. Trump has said he could become “Mr. Veto,” and Democrats lack the two-thirds majority in either chamber to override him. The White House dismissed the plans before the vote; spokeswoman Lauren Bis called them a “decade long witch hunt.”
Democrats expect the administration to invoke executive privilege and slow-walk requests, as it did in Trump’s first term, and plan to subpoena private entities tied to the family instead.
The damage for crypto is political rather than statutory. TD Cowen’s Jaret Seiberg wrote Wednesday that the investigations “may make it impossible to advance a version of Clarity that the crypto sector could back,” and Bloomberg Intelligence has flagged crypto, defense and technology as the sectors most exposed to probes.
This post Democrats to Target Trump’s Crypto Ventures After Taking Congress first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Micah Zimmerman.
