3 October 2024
In his take from this Monday, Nikolaus argued that Donald Trump is heavily pro-Bitcoin. I beg to differ.
Yes, Trump is providing lip service to Bitcoiners, which is more than we can say of Kamala Harris. The fact that he spoke at the Bitcoin conference is certainly interesting, and at least indicates that he’s aware of the “crypto voter” as a potential voting block. And yes, Trump did show up at PubKey, which was a fun little stunt— though he apparently wasn’t even able to make the payment himself.
But it’s blatantly obvious he just wants your money and your vote. Of course, the same can be said for most politicians, but if anything, Trump is a more extreme example of this. He’ll basically scam you for it if he must, whether it’s through these ridiculous NFTs, or with whatever his new shitcoin project is supposed to be.
I’m not at all convinced that Trump will continue to be an ally of Bitcoin if he does get elected for a second term. Even at Bitcoin 2024, his closing remarks —“have fun with your crypto, and Bitcoin, and all the other things you play with”— made clear he doesn’t actually care about Bitcoin in any real way. Indeed, just a few years ago, Trump said he was “not a fan of Bitcoin and other Cryptocurrencies, which are not money, and whose value is highly volatile and based on thin air”.
Right now, Trump needs your money and your vote— but he won’t need that anymore after he is elected. Even if you want to take seriously his blabberings like “miners get all the electricity they need for mining”, is there any reason to believe he won’t throw Bitcoin under the bus the moment that benefits him… most obviously, in favor of the dollar?
Given Trump’s track record of broken campaign promises in his first term, I wouldn’t expect anything else.