Today, Congresswoman Maxine Waters (D-CA), the top Democrat on the House Financial Services Committee, released this statement following President Trump’s latest Executive Order to establish a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve and Digital Asset Stockpile. 

“Since taking office, President Trump has boosted the wealth of crypto billionaires and enriched himself through cryptocurrencies while doing nothing to lower the cost of living for hardworking American families, as he promised on the campaign trail. First, he engineered a large crypto heist through his $Trump meme coin – which collectively lost his investors $2 billion while he and his family pocketed at least $350 million. Following statements made on social media and regulatory-agency actions, he is also pumping his hand-selected crypto market winners, among them his business associates campaign donors, and even members of his cabinet, including David Sacks and Howard Lutnick. And now, his Executive Order creating a Bitcoin reserve and crypto stockpile, by redirecting assets that the government has seized from illegal actors, is the latest action that will benefit, you guessed it, Trump and his cronies.

“If a Bitcoin reserve and digital asset stockpile sounds silly, it’s because it is. Typically, when the government holds strategic reserves, it is for an essential input that powers the U.S. economy and day-to-day life for American families, like oil or resources for our national defense. Crypto, however, does not fall into these categories, because it has no inherent value, nor will it help with our national defense.

“The only people sure to benefit are Trump insiders already holding these cryptocurrencies and looking to capitalize on the government’s involvement – not the average person. In addition to making the very-rich richer, this also incentivizes the Trump Administration to make risky regulatory decisions to prop up the values in the reserves’ holdings and jeopardizes those in the broader market.

“The bottom line is this: If the government wants to hold assets, then it should be assets that benefit the economy and American families. I appreciate that Chair French Hill encouraged President Trump to collaborate with Congress on the structure and funding of any Bitcoin Strategic Reserve. However, the Administration should instead work with Congress to establish robust guardrails and oversight for the very crypto assets Trump seeks to stockpile, so that we can root out the fraud and abuse that has damaged the industry and scammed our nation’s hard-working investors out of billions of dollars.” 

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