Closely resembles big primary donation to Balint campaign
By Guy Page
The $1.1 million Super PAC campaign contribution from an FTX executive that helped Becca Balint win the 2022 Democratic primary appears to be mentioned in a new federal indictment against crypto currency firm FTX owner Samuel Bankman-Fried.
The indictment, filed Feb. 23, claims that Bankman-Fried stole FTX customer deposits, and used billions of dollars in stolen funds to “support the operations and investments of FTX and Alameda; to fund speculative venture investments; to make charitable contributions; to enrich himself; and to try to purchase influence over cryptocurrency regulation in Washington, D.C. by steering tens of millions of dollars of illegal campaign contributions to both Democrats and Republicans.”
The indictment says Bankman-Fried used other FTX to make contributions, to keep his name from being publicly connected to the contributions: “To avoid certain contributions being publicly reported in his name, Bankman-Fried conspired to and did have certain political contributions made in the names of two other FTX executives (“CC-1” and “CC-2”). Those contributions were made directly to candidates in the names of those FTX executives, but with FTX and Alameda funds.”
For instance, Bankman-Fried directed an initially reluctant employee to give about $1 million to a super PAC to support an LGBTQ congressional candidate, the indictment said.
Here’s the exact wording (see Pg. 15):
“In or around 2022, Samuel Bankman-Fried, a/k/a ‘SBF,’ thedefendant, and others agreed that he and his co-conspirators should contribute at least a million dollars to a super PAC that was supporting a candidate running for a United States Congressional seat and appeared to be affiliated with pro-LGBTQ issues, and selected [unnamed SBF business associate] CC-1 to be the contributor. A political consultant working for ‘SBF’ asked CC-1 to make the contribution and told CC-1, ‘in general, you being the center left face of our spending will mean you giving to a lot of woke s–t for transactional purposes.’ CC-1 expressed discomfort with making the contribution in his name, but agreed there was not anyone ‘trusted at FTX [who was] bi/gay’ in a position to make the contribution. At the direction of Samuel Bankman-Fried and individuals working for him, CC-1 nonetheless contributed to the PAC.”
As reported last year, On July 7, FTX software engineering exec Nishad Singh donated $1.1 million to the LGBTQ Victory Fund. The next biggest donor gave $10,000. The PAC then spent $991,000 on the Balint campaign. Simple arithmetic shows that the LGBTQ Victory Fund was just a pass-through from Singh to Balint’s benefit. In the final month before the August 9 primary, a plethora of mailers and advertising helped a surging Balint pummel Lt. Gov. Molly Gray.
The new indictment does not name Balint, nor does it expressly find fault with the gay congresssional candidate who received the FTX funds via Victory Fund passthrough.
At mid-morning today, VDC emailed Balint spokesperson for comment. It will be published as soon as it is received. A Balint spokesperson told VTDigger she is cooperating with federal authorities on the matter.