Having $169 million to spend on U.S. congressional elections can produce fast results in Washington, as the crypto sector's campaign-finance blitz this year helped rid it of a powerful Democratic senator who stood in the way of legislation and also populated Congress with a large number of new friends.
With former President Donald Trump on the verge of securing enough electoral votes to return to the White House, the industry could also — for the first time — have an outspoken ally in the presidency. A commander-in-chief who calls himself the "crypto president" would likely be a boon for the industry, but the gains made earlier in the election had already positioned digital assets with unprecedented advantage.
With the aid of tens of millions the industry spent in Ohio through its Fairshake political action committee, Sherrod Brown's long Senate career is over and a blockchain businessman, Bernie Moreno, will take his place. The loss of Brown, the Democratic chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, also contributed to the Republicans seizing the Senate majority, meaning Brown's committee will have a new GOP chairman who will likely welcome crypto legislation rather than leave it in limbo, as Brown had.
The Senate has been the primary roadblock to legislative progress for crypto measures, such as Financial Innovation and Technology for the 21st Century Act (FIT21) that passed the House earlier this year, or the long-awaited stablecoin bill that also cleared the House.
"Sherrod Brown was a top opponent of cryptocurrency and thanks to our efforts, he will be leaving the Senate," according to a statement from Defend American Jobs, the Fairshake affiliate that concentrated on supporting Republican candidates or opposing anti-crypto Democrats. Moreno, the statement said, "prioritizes innovation, protects American economic interests and will ensure our nationals continued technological leadership."
Whether or not the White House is soon occupied by recent crypto enthusiast Donald Trump, Congress is now much more likely to be working on legislation in the next session that will overpower the views of officials at the Securities and Exchange Commission or the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. If such legislation becomes law, the SEC and CFTC will have to execute it and adopt whatever means it uses to define a crypto security — the question still at the heart of U.S. oversight.
Paul Grewal, the chief legal officer of Coinbase Inc. (COIN), took a moment to post on X during election night to say he hopes the SEC understood the message from voters.
"On many, many issues, the voters said loud and clear that they want change," Grewal wrote. "Crypto is no exception. Stop suing crypto. Start talking to crypto. Initiate rulemaking now. There's no reason to wait."
But the crypto industry's new progress doesn't end there. The Fairshake spending – totalling about $130 million in this cycle — helped shepherd a large number of new faces toward Congress on election night. The super PAC's track record was flawless as the counting continued past midnight, with more than 30 of its 58 favored candidates winning their races and none of them losing.
Though the industry leaders that primarily funded the PAC — Coinbase, Ripple and a16z — kept the PAC's origins and management opaque, the group's strategy was clear. Fairshake and its two affiliate PACs weren't concerned with candidates' other politics as long as they'd support crypto-friendly legislation. And the PACs didn't pretend to be doing anything other than whatever it took to get their picks elected, which meant the crypto groups rarely mentioned crypto at all in the colossal advertising purchases they made, and they weren't shy about dumping overwhelming amounts of cash into each chosen race.
The result — which had been previewed by the crypto PACs' predecessor GMI in the 2022 races – was a significant number of candidates winning primaries in districts purposefully chosen because the primary winner's party would be likely to win in the general election. That's why Fairshake's picks performed so well on election night.
The industry's campaign financing also went to current lawmakers that had been working on the industry's behalf already, such as Majority Whip Tom Emmer, a Minnesota Republican, and Ritchie Torres, a New York Democrat.
In the first hours of Wednesday, former President Trump held what seemed to be an insurmountable electoral-count advantage, pulling within a handful of votes of the 270 needed for a return to the presidency. If he retakes the White House, the Republican has promised sudden and dramatic help for crypto, including the intention to remove SEC Chair Gary Gensler from that role.
Still, the outcome of the White House fight has already become less urgent for crypto. Whatever happens, the Senate will be controlled next year by the party that has crypto support in its platform.
And with at least two dozen freshman, crypto-friendly representatives starting their careers in the House of Representatives in January, the number of members who support digital assets on Capitol Hill is swelling considerably.
