Do Democrats Really Hate Crypto? Rep. Ro Khanna

Bitcoin and crypto are the next generation of financial Innovation and store of value Democrats which are the party of the future will make sure that America leads uh in this welcome to bankless where today we explore the frontier of the Democrats on crypto the question today is there a frontier there uh that was the question for um congressman roana who is a Democrat who's been very supportive of crypto and trying to gain the support of

the Biden Administration and now the Harris campaign this is Ryan John Adams I'm here with David Hoffman and we're here to help you become more Bank list they help the Democrats become more bankless they need it yeah because they need it the most yeah so I guess context going to this episode we've had a number of congressman and politicians uh Representatives Senators even on Bank list most of those have skewed Republican almost all of them not because we've hand selected uh it's because we're looking for uh politicians that have something to say on crypto by the way we would we would bring on

someone who has something negative to say about crypto so Elizabeth Warr if it was legit yeah Elizabeth Warren you are welcome to come on Bank list we have a discussion about crypto in fact we would bipartisan podcast we would enjoy that um but the challenge today one of us would the challenge today has been actually finding Democrats that will speak about this so uh but representative ran is certainly a supporter he's done a lot of work in the space and we wanted to get his take on why Comm Harris hasn't embraced crypto been Pro crypto as part of her platform

and the bigger question David is if K Harris wins the White House again are we going to get another four years of what we just had operation chokepoint a Gary gendler style SEC that is attacking us American entrepreneurs in the space or like is there going to be some armist what's going to happen I don't really think the KLA campaign has given representative Kana that much clay to work with yeah but he still nonetheless illustrates a growing interest in the Democratic party around crypto uh and I

think he has Illustrated a few key members of the democratic party at the top who are still like anti- crypto I think we can all guess who that is um but nonetheless there is like a growing younger generation of Democrats the the Richie teses uh who are kind of coming from the bottom up that are slowly taking over the Democratic party um i'llbe it slowly and so um I think that's kind of my big take away here is that like eventually uh everyone will become Pro crypto it's just a matter of kind of just there are some older more

entrenched Democrats who kind of like need to get out of the way well hopefully they will guys let us know what you think at the end of this episode this is Rana we'll be right back with him but before we do we want to thank the sponsors that made this possible including our recommended exchange the place to go get your crypto in a bipartisan fashion that is Kracken go create an account if you want a crypto Trading being experience backed by worldclass security and awardwinning support teams then head over to Kraken one of the longest standing and most secure crypto Platforms in the world

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say as one of the leading advocates for crypto in the Democratic party and more recently he's been working on brokering meetings between crypto people and the White House including also the KLA Harris campaign I think one of his goals is really to make Pro crypto part of the Dem Democrat uh public policy so R cona welcome to banglas thank you thank you for having me in that introduction so we uh recently had a debate I don't know if you caught that uh but we had a debate between KLA Harris and Donald Trump

first of all reaction to that like who won that debate pretty clear that uh vice president Harris won partly she was just uh more disciplined and she was able to uh land uh her points and Trump was anding all over the place but you know debates Are One Moment In Time that doesn't mean that she's won the election the election is going to be very very close and they're still a lot of work to do with undecided voters uh and I still view this as a tossup Race So David and

I had this uh small little bet like a gentleman's agreement going into the uh the debate and so I thought that there was some non-zero chance that crypto would actually get mentioned in the debate either Trump would bring it up or something probably not a moderator type question uh but it would be brought up somehow D David said there's no chance in hell like that's just not going to happen right and so he turned out to be right I was wrong uh let me ask you am I naive to think that crypto could actually come up in a uh in a debate is it of national interest or and

importance or is that just like naive and and kind of the cry crypto information bubble talking well certainly there's a chance Trump would mention it I mean he mentioned you know uh falsely that migrants were eating animals so I me you never know what what what what Trump's GNA say uh but but I don't think it's reached the the level yet where a uh ABC moderator would ask about it but but it should be a part of the national conversation for a number of reasons I mean one it's just an Financial

Innovation right you have Bitcoin and crypto now doing what I would say is three key things one it's a modern store of value it used to be that gold was a store of value for cultural reasons for reasons of Simplicity uh Bitcoin for many and crypto more generally has become the store uh of value and it's easier to transfer than than gold is now it's more volatile the markets because of Bitcoin and crypto because gold has been a 5,000 year mature Market uh but uh it is the modern version of a s value

second it is a version of making payments and particularly payments across uh borders and then in a global economy is critical especially if you believe America should play a role in the world uh the reality is Bitcoin and crypto is one of the ways to make payments zel and FedEx fed now does it but this is an alternative way and a decentralized way and third with things like ethereum it provides an opportunity for development on on on the platform uh and new new applications and developments of of new companies so

these are Financial innovations that uh we ought to be aware of and America should lead it yeah uh kind this is what we see uh in the crypto industry certainly uh and this is I think also perhaps maybe some of the um reasons why part of the crypto industry is confused about why the Biden and now comma Administration seems to be so resistant to even broaching the subject about the cryptocurrency industry publicly the uh the Trump Administration seems to have

no problems talking about um being in interested in fostering innovation in the cryptocurrency industry here at home but we haven't seen that level of openness to even discussing the issue uh and so as a result uh our worst fears are being projected onto the kamla administration simply because of the silence the void that is being left from the kamla administration do you know why there has been this hesitation to even address the issue of crypto by the by the Comm Administration well I think there was generational opposition among

uh some voices in the Democratic party to uh crypto and Bitcoin there was a fear that it was just speculative in instrument and that's why I tried to make the use cases uh those three Central use cases and I what I've tried to tell tell folks is it's just a a technological innovation in finance and why should we rest on our world we have the most sophisticated Finance system in the world but if there are new uh forms of transmitting payments and storing value then don't you want to leave in that and by the way this has been

adopted you you it's irrelevant whether you think it's good or not there are millions of people who are using it and uh uh America should believe in that the criticism that I often get now is less of there's more growing acceptance of uh the need for this in the United States now people are talking about the illicit uses and is is Iran that's doing some of the Bitcoin mining uh 5% of it or so some percent of it are they benefiting is Russia benefiting or Bad actors North Korea benefiting and I I I think that is

addressable partly because it's a very small percentage uh I think most people I talk to bitcoin and crypto agree that you shouldn't have illicit uses of it just like you shouldn't have illicit uses of dollars and if anything you could trace Bitcoin uh and you know are open to to to normal law enforcement action but that doesn't mean that uh you have the the suppression of of these companies where they're going offshore and so I think it's a matter of Education I don't know if we'll get there in time for the election but I do

think over the next few years we'll get there so one thing that we are I about is these meetings that uh you have been organizing between various Pro crypto members of of our industry and the interested side of the White House the interested side of the democratic party how is that interest actually going how how are those meetings going how what's the progress like in this discourse and also thank you thank you thank you for your service appreciate it well thank you I mean it's been very we've had some of the leading uh people in the Bitcoin crypto space people like Mark Cuban Brian Armstrong Mike

nrat companies like Ripple and others that uh have been represented in these conversations that they've been very Frank I mean they they they feel that uh you know rules that don't allow Banks to hold uh crypto assets without declaring them as liabilities are uh problematic they feel that Banks aren't taking uh individual accounts for people uh who have crypto assets and they' voice set they think that there's been a lot of Regulation through litigation that it's

one think if Congress passes legislation saying here's how how to regulate it but it's not think if you just have agency trying to make law by by by suing and uh been very Frank and I I I all of the companies by the they want regulation all of them they that what happened let's say with s be freed or was terrible and that there should not be loot balls there should not be abuse there shouldn't be ways of uh the the money getting to Iran's government or things they're all for sensible regulations but they want to know that

they're clear that they're pragmatic uh and that they are welcoming of the Bitcoin and crypto industry and they've been blunt that they haven't thought that that this Administration hasn't had that uh approach uh and have sent that to to very high profile people uh in in the administration uh and my sense is that people are listening I've seen you know a a a th and understanding uh among some of the Senators among some of the senior folks that uh this industry is

here to stay and we need to try to understand it and then have thoughtful regulation yeah I I got to say I had some optimism because of course you know uh the Biden Administration has been you know at least in the the administrative side some somewhat hostile towards crypto and certainly members of the administration like Gary Gensler have been like almost overtly hostile I'm sure many of the industry Advocates that you had in these meetings reflected these things like their banking uh is getting choked off it's a complete uh you know unclear in terms of what's a

security and what's a commodity we've got like five or six us companies now some of our best I mean the this the Bad actors are out of the space at this point you got fantastic companies doing great work in the United States and they're getting these uh nasams these Wells notices from um the SEC um saying what they're doing is is uh potentially illegal and it feels arbitrary and capricious is is something that the the judges uh keep saying so the the dialogue that that you're having is uh

incredibly important I think we saw an opportunity we were hoping for an opportunity when um kamla sort of took took the mantle of nominee Presidential nominee that there might be some sort of a pivot there's been a lot of conversation about okay will the administration pivot on crypto uh the DNC platform came out and they had the DNC convention and crypto wasn't mentioned I mean there's like 94 Pages there's even a section on artificial intelligence but no crypto crypto so I

mean maybe it's too soon or something but like we're looking at that and we're like okay well do does the uh Democrat Party not have a position on crypto so Ro is and you know it doesn't feel fair that you are you know kind of the spokesperson for the entire party and like uh keep in mind we know you have been doing fantastic work in the crypto space trying to educate but seems like there's a lot more education to go or we would have made it in that platform document so what's your explanation as as far as to like why the absence is it

just like too soon is not enough people getting it like what's going on here well I think it's a fair question and the reality is that there was a lot of opposition within uh the older generation in the Democratic party to to to bitcoin and crypto I think partly people thought it that it thought of it as just speculative and they were concerned is this going to lead to some kind of financial crash like there was the the great crash in 2008 you and they weren't looking at it as modern store of value as a modern payment system as

something that uh was here to stay uh as a new form of financial Innovation uh and obviously there's always risk in any Financial system but you want to diversify Financial Innovation and have proper regulation and that that this wasn't just some kind of uh investor speculative Ponzi SE and so uh that has taken uh time uh there was a big setback after Sam bman freed uh and that gave an upper hand to those who were questioning crypto's a very utility uh and now uh

some of the new generation like me and and others are taking a a stance that we should be hostile to the industry but you're right that uh we haven't succeeded yet in getting it in the platform we haven't succeeded uh in converting uh all of the party leadership it's a work in progress and I'd be lying if I said okay it's going to happen uh in the next 60 days I mean I but I am confident over time we can get there because they shouldn't be a part of an issue it was always my idea

uh that Biden never really had a stance about crypto he was more of a blank slate he was going to kind of delegate that out to people who were more informed uh and and representative Conor you keep on um bringing up like older members of of Congress that are kind of like leading the charge on the Democratic party's Pro or or crypto stance at all and my mind goes to Elizabeth Warren who is very opinionated about what crypto should be inside of America uh it shouldn't be much at all inside of America according to her is more or less her position uh and I'm just wondering

if if I also kind of think that maybe kamla also is similarly like Biden maybe she just doesn't personally have that much of a stance so she's willing to delegate out uh but if we're delegating out to these same older generations of the democratic party to me that kind of reads that it's until the older generation of Democrats kind of move on and get replaced by younger generations of Democrats then the Democrats are more or less going to have the same consistent resistance towards crypto until we can have some younger younger Democrats kind of Take Over Control of the party that's kind of my

interpretation how do you how do you reflect upon that well I think that they there's been movement already Senator Schumer for example has uh come out and said that the rule uh requiring Banks to have liability uh for every crypto asset was not a good Rule and voted to to overturn that and I voted to override the president's veto with 20 some other democ R and there were 79 Democrats including nyi who voted for fit 21 with Patrick mcken so it it is changing I

believe that uh the younger folks people like Wally Nichols myself AR Tes dto are having a warer voice uh and some of the traditional folks like Jenny Yellen Etc are uh backing off a little bit they're Focus Less on uh domestic uh regulation as and I'm more concerned with the international implications of the assets getting in the wrong hands and that is something that there can be more consensus but you know I'm not I I think there's still work to be done and what

we need to do is first there was no voice now there is a voice and there's there also really need the politics of it I said it's not about the crypto money it's about the millions of Voters people who who who are by the way many of them are young voters who we and some of them are are this forly young man which the party is struggling with all the polling so you know this is an area that uh the party needs to be on the right side of to to get the the the younger generation yeah certainly I one thing

that hasn't made sense to us in the political calculus of this row is uh it feels like free real estate for uh the Democrat Party that basically they're seeding to Republicans and certainly at the you know presidential level have kind of seated this issue to Trump and as you said with with kind of voters being uh very important of course like crypto has historically you know trended male very male uh you like that this seems like free real estate like why give that up with without a fight so I

don't understand the political calculus of it as well but maybe as you say that's starting to change it's just like won't change in time for November well the clock takes every day and I mean I look inity still arist campaign they they've been ared this they've got so many things they got to talk about grocery prices they've got to talk about housing they've got to talk about immigration and this is uh on their radar but they're in a Sprint right I mean I think if we had a year and a half of a traditional campaign I saying we would we would definitely get this done but in 58 days I I don't I don't know

what I can tell you is that there are uh Democrats who are pushing to change the party's Direction on it uh or pushing it on substantive grounds like I am uh and that uh over time we need to build a uh a broad Coalition for Bitcoin and crypto because it's here to stay and I want to are the leading in it and I I do think that crypto and Bitcoin voters are uh are fairm minded I mean but when I meet them they look at my record they look at what you say they all just judge you

based on the party I think partisanship also is declined among the younger generation they want to know what what are you for and uh and that's I think going to be the the challenge for all politicians going forward oh we are definitely um active in looking at politicians records uh that's for sure every chance we get we tell our listen go to St stand withth

crypto.com but let's fast forward let's say k Harris wins and if you go to the kind of the polls or the prediction markets it's a coin toss we at like 50/50 uh in terms of percentage so let's say a Harris White House is the next Administration will operation chokepoint continue is the question this is kind of a a nightmare scenario I guess for us daveid and I both live in the unit United States we're entrepreneurs we have a crypto um business we know many that are like us like you know a ton and

they are worried that another four years of a hostile SEC or maybe hostile banking Regulators of one sort or another um you know economic ad advisors to the White House cabinet to the White House all of these things will prove disastrous for this burgeoning decentralized finance and crypto industry in the United States if KLA Harris wins will we get another four years of crypto hostility do you think or is there the chance that this softens and how do we even make that change

happen I don't think there's a chance that it softens can I guarantee it no because uh you know I I I'm pushing towards that but can I tell you that I will be loud of another house to say we can't have operation Chuck point and we need someone reasonable uh who is going to be thoughtful and about this in in the administrative PL places absolutely and will I oppose very loudly hostile attacks uh yes I did that if there was a republican Administration and you know if it's Donald Trump and he flips it

changes his mind because he was you know he was hostile to cryp now he's fully embraced it but I do it in either case so uh you certainly are going to have people in the house of the Senate who are going going to be uh Champions and Advocates uh and we have more credibility than we did in the beginning of the Biden Administration where we were really seeing more as uh on the the friend side now I think you know more people are listening to us you know I I can't make firm commitment ahead of what the vice president herself has said that's what we're trying to get get them

to say is that there's not going to be operation choke point that they welcome the industry in the United States that they're going to have Smart thoughtful uh regulations and endorse fit 21 approach to to that I mean that's that's exactly I don't think it has to be a long policy I think it just has to be three four uh clear commitments yeah and I'm sure you're telling them there there are votes on the lines and and support on the line we have seen the softening a little bit in in Congress you point with the Sab 12 121 uh repeal and also fit um

so so that's been nice I mean whether that carries over into kind of the White House is another question but if you had your brothers like you were writing the Democrat policy on crypto so um what would you wanted to say I feel like the Republicans at this point actually have a pretty decent it's it's very short mind you but it covers a number of things like we will defend the right to mine Bitcoin ensure every American has the right to self- custody the name of this podcast uh row is Bank list the right to go bankless is very important uh of their digital assets and transact free and from government surveillance

and control something like that is what we're looking for but what what would you write if if you had to write the party platform here I would say America has uh always led the world in uh Financial Innovation uh Bitcoin and crypto are the next generation of financial Innovation and store of value Democrats which are the party of the future will make sure that America leads uh in this and we want to make sure that our technology is leading and engaging with the world we're not isolationists

that just care about transactions in our own order the Democrats and the party that wants to reach out uh to engage with the rest of the world and to do so uh we need to recognize the right to to to self- custody for not just people uh in the United States but people around the world 40 54% of who are under authoritarian regimes or and many who are under regimes with uh runaway inflation uh and we need to make sure that we appreciate that that Bitcoin and crypto are new soures of value new ways

of having payments uh that provide protection uh perhaps to people out outside America facing authoritarianism even more uh than inside America and America should lead in this new system uh that ultimately is about uh freedom and and and ultimately is about engaging with people and uh in in more efficient ways new projects are coming online to the mantle layer 2 every single week why is this happening maybe it's because mantle has been on the frontier of layer

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pay the least possible amount of taxes while still maintaining legal compliance with tok's guidance you can concentrate on building your company while toku handles the logistics token launches don't have to be complicated talk to toku today to get a free initial token valuation representative kanana do you have any idea or indication about what kamla might or might not do with Gary gendler uh has been rumored that Gary's ASP aspiring to be the treasury secretary uh maybe he also just remains as SEC chair do you have any idea of like what um the Comm Administration

might do with Gary I do not and it's one place where I have uh been very careful because as a member of Congress I really do respect the uh independence of those agencies so unlike some of folks I I never comment uh on uh sort of an agency's decision because I want to I make the case for bigcoin and crypto on policy grounds and I don't want anyone ever saying oh Kan is trying to interfere for any particular entity uh so but you know that's something that uh the vice president would do and she she

instead of commenting on uh gel who's currently in the SEC she could just say here are the types of people I would uh put in these positions and I think that that would be helpful Ro you are the uh second Democrat uh in Congress that we've had on Bank list so far we've had uh you like many more Republicans uh on that side of the aisle we also had uh Richie Torres on who is absolutely fantastic on this issue also exuse younger which is uh interesting but just has a dynamic ideas for why the uh

Democrat party should be aligned to crypto why crypto values are are also Democrat um party values uh how many more crypto Advocates do we have in the DNC right now I mean can we count them on like one hand two hands or do we have more than that so what we do I say people like Jake aen Claus a really smart guy up in Massachusetts Jonathan Jackson Jesse Jackson Reverend Jackson son will represent Chicago a prominent uh vocal Advocate uh Darren Soo uh Rising store

Latino member in in Florida you probably have 20 or so the people who voted to overturn the president's veto on uh uh on the SEC rule those I would say are Advocates but the fact that you had 80 80 people 79 people vote uh for fit21 shows that you know it's a it's a growing group uh of folks and I I'd like this issue to not be be partisan you know I'd like I I don't want to be seen as uh a champion in the community I'll take it it's a great base but I I'd like

this to be seen as okay this is something that we can agree on you know it'd be like say would be like against AI I mean you know we can debate what are good regulations about AI how do you keep it safe but if someone was just like I'm I don't want AI well you're basically saying well you don't want America to be Innovative you don't want America to to lead right or I don't want iPhones or I don't want social media I mean no one says that right I mean people say their excess is he regulated so I I rather we have the debate about what is the appropriate ways of uh of of

of a regulation uh as opposed to this kind of reflexive sense now where there's a contingent of the democratic party that's been opposed to to to do Bitcoin and and and crypto the Democrats were very Tech favorable in in the 1990s right under uh Bill Clinton and others so it feels like maybe a return to that is uh in store but there there's a number of your colleagues who actually don't have a position it seems like are kind of undecided my question to you is how do we convince them how do you convince them I I think it's having