As the political winds shift in the volatile crypto industry, one of the sector’s staunchest supporters is redoubling its efforts to support blockchain-friendly candidates in the upcoming US elections.
On Thursday, Chris Dixon, founder and managing partner of a16z crypto—the $7.6 billion digital assets arm of venture capital giant Andreessen Horowitz—announced that the firm would donate $25 million to Fairshake, a cryptocurrency-focused super-PAC, bringing total spending a16z $47 million. One of the most active venture capitalists in the sector, crypto firm a16z is backing companies from Coinbase to OpenSea, and Dixon recently completed a global book tour for his treatise on blockchain. Read Write it yourself.
a16z’s contribution comes a day after Ripple, another leading crypto company, announced a $25 million donation to Fairshake, which together with its two affiliates has raised more than $100 million.
While crypto advocacy efforts in DC have faced difficult prospects following the collapse of FTX in November 2022 and the ignominious fall from grace of founder and huge political donor Sam Bankman-Fried, the sector has experienced a resurgence in the past few weeks, including several key legislative victories in Congress and an obvious mitigation from the White House. Donald Trump has also joined the sector, recently declaring his support at a crypto event held at Mar-a-Lago and also attending a Libertarian Party event.
a16z’s additional support for Fairshake reflects a concerted industry effort to tip the scales in key congressional races, including the fight for Sherrod Brown, the Democratic senator from Ohio and a crypto skeptic who chairs the Senate Banking Committee. A recent report from consumer advocacy organization Public Citizen found that digital asset super PACs, including Fairshake, raised the third most money of any super PAC ahead of the 2024 election. Other Fairshake donors include Coinbase and the Winklevoss twins.
As Dixon noted in an accompanying tweet, the Super PAC has supported candidates on both sides of the political aisle, although cryptocurrency has received more support from Republicans over the past year, including House Financial Services Chairman Patrick McHenry (R-N.C.), who is spearheading a series of bills. Despite the Republican bias, recent votes have received bipartisan support, including a successful legislative effort to overturn a controversial Securities and Exchange Commission ballot measure that registered a 60-38 vote in the Senate, although President Joe Biden has threatened to veto it.
That may be changing given the events of the past two weeks, which saw the SEC make a surprise U-turn on pending applications for Ethereum ETFs that industry analysts expected to be rejected but the agency approved. Given Trump’s newfound love for blockchain, some of the industry’s loudest voices have pointed to the reversal as a sign that Democrats want to avoid cryptocurrency becoming a partisan issue. With Fairshake’s growing war chest and a tight race across the country just months away, the digital asset sector’s political offensive is just beginning.