On November 6, according to data from the Stand With Crypto website initiated by Coinbase, a total of 247 candidates who support cryptocurrencies won seats in the House of Representatives, and only 113 members opposed to cryptocurrencies. The Stand With Crypto website also shows that the Senate is also inclined to support cryptocurrencies, with 15 supporters and 10 opponents.

Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong praised the results of the parliamentary election as a watershed for cryptocurrencies, and wrote on Twitter: "Welcome to the new members of Congress who are most supportive of cryptocurrencies in the history of the United States."

The House of Representatives has more members and represents a diverse range of representatives, and usually initiates legislation, while the Senate is smaller and more conservative, and usually considers proposals initiated by the House of Representatives. Since both the House of Representatives and the Senate tend to support cryptocurrencies, the road to favorable legislation may be smoother, and crypto industry insiders are optimistic about the potential for supportive regulation by the U.S. Congress in the future.

And to make this happen, it is inseparable from the real money of those Crypto industry practitioners.

40 million US dollars to support the campaign, crypto lobbying funds become the "key tie breaker" for the Republicans to win the Senate

On November 6, Ohio auto dealer and blockchain entrepreneur, Republican Bernie Moreno defeated Senate Banking Committee Chairman, strong critic of cryptocurrency, Ohio Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown, so that the Democratic Party defeated the Republican Party in the Senate by 51 to 49. Moreno's victory can be said to guarantee the Republican Party to win back the upper house of Congress. This is also regarded as one of the most expensive Senate races this year.

Winning with money

This campaign is supported not only by Trump and his campaign team, but also by several crypto companies, company executives and investors, who spent $40 million to help Moreno win the seat. According to Coindesk, Federal Election Commission documents show that this largest single campaign expenditure from the digital asset industry was funded by Fairshake PAC and its affiliated organizations (especially Defend American Jobs), far exceeding the organization's initial investment of $12 million in Ohio. These funds are mainly used to support Moreno's advertising campaigns, which is the most money invested by any group in this key battlefield to date.

Since Fairshake intervened in the election in August this year, Ohio voters' attitudes towards Moreno have improved significantly. An industry poll showed that in early August, Moreno's support rate among likely voters was 39.6%, while Brown's was 48.3%. According to continuous polling statistics from the political analysis website FiveThirtyEight.com, Moreno's support rate has increased by 2.3 percentage points since Fairshake began operations in Ohio.

Until November 6, Bernie Moreno received majority support in the final election, winning a key battle and winning a majority for the Republican Party. Meanwhile, Senator Tim Scott (R-South Carolina) may become the next chairman. Although Scott's crypto stance has long been low-key, he recently publicly supported digital asset innovation at the Bitcoin 2024 event in Nashville and said at the SALT conference in Wyoming that if he is elected chairman, a dedicated crypto subcommittee may be established.

Super PACs like Fairshake can only support candidates through so-called independent expenditures - that is, advertising and other services that are not directly related to the campaign team or approved by it. In some campaigns, Fairshake has invested millions in negative ads against candidates who do not support pro-crypto policies, but in this campaign, the ads are positive and aimed at supporting Moreno.

Sell the company All In blockchain, who is Bernie Moreno?

And what’s gratifying is that Bernie Moreno, who won this key seat, is not just a pro-crypto politician, but a real Crypto practitioner.

Reagan McCarthy, a spokesperson for Bernie Moreno, once told The Washington Post, “Bernie is not like Sherrod Brown, who doesn’t know the difference between blockchain and chainsaws, and Bernie has a deep understanding of this technology, knows how to ensure it develops in the United States, and will work hard to ensure that the United States leads the world.”

In 2019, Moreno, a luxury car dealership magnate living in Cleveland, sold seven car dealerships, retaining only two, in order to support his other company, Crypto project Ownum, which provides digital car title products.

Moreno launched a project called "Blockland" in 2018, which aims to make Cleveland a blockchain technology center. At the same time, he founded the crypto project Ownum. Ownum is in the business of developing technology products that can replace paper-based government processes through digitization.

In April 2019, Moreno was appointed to the Executive Committee of the Ohio Innovation Authority. At the time of Moreno's appointment, Ownum announced its first product, a paperless blockchain project for vehicle ownership called CHAMPtitles.

Moreno also served as a consultant to the Ohio Department of Motor Vehicles, during which time CHAMPtitles was given the opportunity to work with the DMV to digitize the vehicle ownership transfer process, a collaboration that provided CHAMPtitles with significant business growth opportunities.

In September 2019, Moreno was nominated to the board of directors of Cleveland's public hospital system MetroHealth, and in October, Ownum's second product, Vital Chain, which provides blockchain-based birth and death certificates, successfully reached a partnership with MetroHealth and became its first customer.

Later, Moreno resigned from the board of directors when preparing for his first Senate election, but these past events were also used by Moreno's political opponents to attack him as evidence that he was not a "political outsider."

The ratio of enemies to friends is close to 1:3. Welcome to the most pro-crypto Congress in American history

When Trump won 270 votes, the US crypto industry was celebrating a major victory. After the victory, a meme of Gary Gensler, the current chairman of the SEC, quickly spread in the crypto community.

This is because Trump made a promise to the crypto community during this year's election: if he is elected the 47th President of the United States, he will fire the SEC chairman who is full of regulatory hostility to the crypto industry.

In order to win this election, Trump frantically showed goodwill to people in the crypto industry during this year's campaign and became a Bitcoin activist. At the Bitcoin 2024 conference held in Nashville in July, Trump mentioned that if he could win the election, he would formulate a series of pro-crypto policies to ensure that the United States becomes the world's crypto center and Bitcoin superpower. This includes firing the current SEC Chairman Gray Gensler, appointing a presidential advisory committee on cryptocurrencies, and using Bitcoin as a strategic Bitcoin reserve for the United States.

Related reading: Trump becomes the first "Bitcoin president" in American history

After Trump won the election, many industry insiders began to be optimistic about the industry's more clear and supportive regulatory policies in the future. Of course, replacing a pro-crypto president and firing an anti-crypto chairman cannot fundamentally reverse the pressure that cryptocurrencies face at the political level in the United States. What really makes institutions and various practitioners optimistic and even excited is that the United States is about to usher in a brand new "pro-crypto Congress."

According to Stand With Crypto, a total of 261 candidates who support cryptocurrency won seats in the House of Representatives in this election, while only 116 members opposed cryptocurrency. At the same time, the new Senate is also more inclined to support cryptocurrency, with 17 supporters and 12 opponents.

After the election results came out, Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong praised the results of this parliamentary election as a watershed in the development of cryptocurrency on social media, calling it "the most cryptocurrency-supportive Congress in the history of the United States."

Of course, not the entire Congress is showing a one-sided trend towards cryptocurrency. In the Senate, although the pro-crypto Republican candidate John Deaton received a lot of support from the crypto industry, he still lost to Elizabeth Warren, who has more senior political resources and resume. This long-time "mortal enemy" of the crypto industry has always advocated for stronger regulation in the past. After successfully being re-elected as a Democratic senator in Massachusetts, she has also become one of the few "tough nuts" for the crypto industry in the Senate.

In fact, before this election, the Republican Party had already begun to work towards the formation of a "pro-crypto government." Poll data shows that currently 28% of Republicans hold or have purchased cryptocurrencies, and 60% of Republicans prefer Congress to clarify crypto regulations. The FIT21 bill passed by Congress this year was also led and promoted by the Republicans.

In May of this year, the FIT21 bill was passed by the House of Representatives with 279 votes to 136. The bill established a regulatory framework for digital assets and may become one of the most far-reaching bills on Crypto at present. The full name of FIT21 is "Financial Innovation and Technology Act for the 21st Century". The key point is to regulate the regulatory framework for digital assets, and provide guidance for more crypto assets to apply for spot ETFs and compliance in the future.

After successfully controlling both the Senate and the House of Representatives, the Republican Party will undoubtedly become a powerful party unmatched by previous governments. In any case, the new Congress has paved the way for the passage of a series of crypto-friendly bills.

American politics enters the "crypto-dollar" era

It is no accident that the Republican Party leans towards the pro-crypto camp, and Congress leans towards the Republican Party. What is certain is that American politics is entering a new "crypto-dollar" era.

In June, Trump held a fundraising event at the home of Peter Thiel's friend David Sachs in the wealthy district of San Francisco. During the event, Trump portrayed himself as the "cryptocurrency president", slammed the Democratic Party's regulatory hostility to the industry, and said that he would stop Gensler's crackdown on the crypto industry "within an hour of taking office." In the end, Trump raised $12 million from the event.

Related reading: "Silicon Valley Turns Right: Peter Thiel, A16Z, and the Political Ambition of Cryptocurrency"

According to OpenSecret, a political fundraising data tracking platform, this year's cryptocurrency industry political action committees have invested more than $133 million in elections and intervened in 51 campaigns, mainly to help candidates who promise not to severely regulate cryptocurrencies. The three most prominent PACs are Fairshake, Protect Progress, and Defend American Jobs.

Fairshake’s ads almost never mention cryptocurrency, blockchain, or the tech industry. Instead, they focus on the candidates — touting Moreno’s family and his views on the energy industry, for example, as Trump’s.

In February 2024, Fairshake spent $10 million attacking the integrity of Katie Porter, who was running for a vacant California Senate seat, because Porter had voted against pro-cryptocurrency bills. As a result, Porter lost the primary to Rep. Adam Schiff.

The cryptocurrency industry saw this as validation for its strategy of spending money to support friends as well as to destabilize enemies.

Fairshake also contributed to the defeat of New York State Representatives Jamaal Bowman and Cori Bush in the primary elections. It invested $2 million in Bowman and $1.4 million in Bush. In the Utah Republican primary, Fairshake spent $3.4 million to support John Curtis, who defeated Trent Staggs. Curtis, who is pro-crypto industry, won the Utah Senate seat.

Since the beginning of this year, US Crypto companies and investment institutions, led by Coinbase, Ripple, a16z, and Jump Crypto, have finally ushered in a foreseeable optimistic outlook for the industry by spending money.

Just two days before Election Day, a16z partner Chris Dixon posted on social media that he donated more than $23 million to Fairshake and its associated political action committee (PAC) for the 2026 midterm election cycle.

Coinbase founder Brian Armstrong posted that Coinbase and a16z have provided additional financial support to Fairshake, and Fairshake has invested about $78 million in the 2026 midterm elections. The Stand With Crypto website he founded currently has 1.9 million supporters, with the goal of increasing the number of supporters to 4 million in the 2026 midterm elections.

Armstrong said Stand With Crypto also plans to expand its influence internationally. "The crypto industry hopes to promote similar rules in the G20 or on a broader international scale. Only through global adoption can cryptocurrencies revolutionize the global financial system and enhance economic freedom."

In the first half of 2022, the SEC issued the SAB121 (Staff Accounting Bulletin No. 121) bill, forcing banks to stay away from crypto custody business. In April of this year, the anti-SAB121 bill passed the Senate and the House of Representatives with a bipartisan effort, but was vetoed by current President Biden. With the rise of Trump and his pro-crypto government, the beginning of a new era of cryptocurrency compliance seems to have become an increasingly certain event.

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