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- SBF frequently visited White House to meet important people including the President’s Counselor.
- His visits were to discuss crypto; he tried to deviate authorities towards DeFi.
- SBF met Steve Ricchetti, president’s counselor, 2 months before the FTX collapse.
In the ongoing investigation in the infamous FTX saga, where former CEO and co-founder Sam Bankman-Fried, ex-CTO and co-founder of FTX Gary Wang, and Alameda Research’s Caroline Ellison are the main accused among others in the multi-billion dollar financial fraud.
SBF reportedly met with top government officials on various occasions in 2022. One of those meetings was just two months before the implosion of the once second-largest largest cryptocurrency exchange in the world.
The White House releases the visitors log every month. The log shows SBF met with the Counselor to the President, Steve Ricchetti on April 22nd, 2022 and May 12th, 2022; and on May 13th, 2022 he met with policy advisor Charlotte Butash. Media reports also suggest Bankman meeting again with President’s counselor Steve on September 8, 2022 that is not shown on the visitor logs.
After these visits came to light, the crypto community questioned the purpose and agenda, if there was any for these frequent visits and meetings with pivotal officials. Was there any backend lobbying going on? Did the officials know or had any idea about the FTX’s fraud? There are several speculations and rumors in the community.
Looking at the logs, it becomes clear that SBF had meetings at the White House four times before the midterm elections in 2022. Some politicians have been accused of accepting funds from Sam, although they are willing to return the money.
People demand an explanation from the Biden administration as to why they have had frequent meetings with fraud accused.
Some reports suggest that the discussions during this were specifically focused on the crypto industry, exchanges, and pandemic prevention and could also be on the crypto bill rather than politics.
Although Sam lived in the Bahamas, his frequent visits to Washington, pushing and influencing authorities over crypto policy and regulations, and making strong and valuable connections tells a different side of the FTX-saga. He is also accused of redirecting regulators toward DeFi platforms, such as MakerDAO, of deviating them from centralized exchanges.
Sam Bankman-Fried was on the special donor list for the Democrats, and crypto vlogger Tiffany Fong revealed that he donated similar money to both parties, but his “Republican donations were dark.”
The FTX saga is one of the biggest frauds of the century, involving billions of dollars the involvement of powerful personalities, and the tangled web of facts which need to be unraveled soon.
Andrew is a blockchain developer who developed his interest in cryptocurrencies while pursuing his post-graduation major in blockchain development. He is a keen observer of details and shares his passion for writing, along with coding. His backend knowledge about blockchain helps him give a unique perspective to his writing skills, and a reliable craft at explaining the concepts such as blockchain programming, languages and token minting. He also frequently shares technical details and performance indicators of ICOs and IDOs.
