Embattled cryptocurrency mogul Sam Bankman-Fried directed tens of millions of dollars of illegal campaign contributions to elected officials, prosecutors alleged in a new superseding indictment unsealed Thursday in a Manhattan federal court.
The new 12-count indictment adds four more charges related to the collapse of the 30-year-old’s cryptocurrency exchange, FTX, which prosecutors say was a “multibillion-dollar fraud.”
Bankman-Fried became one of the biggest Democratic donors in the country during last year’s midterm elections, with a net worth estimated at one point to be greater than $20 billion and dreams of spending up to $1 billion on the 2024 presidential contest.
But Bankman-Fried’s political giving was not all it seemed, according to the new indictment.
The indictment accuses Bankman-Fried of directing at least 300 illegal campaign donations, totaling up to $100 million, to both Democrats and Republicans through two other unnamed FTX executives that acted as “straw donors” to hide the true source of the funds.
The scheme was used, prosecutors allege, to evade federal contribution limits, hide the illegal source of some of the money, and protect Bankman-Fried’s reputation by keeping his name off of donations to political candidates and causes that did not align with his center-left public image.
Prosecutors don’t allege that any of the recipients of the donations — including several members of Congress — were aware that the donations they received were in violation of the law. Many members of Congress have vowed to donate contributions they received from Bankman-Fried to charity.