The Trump administration’s Justice Department has been directed to disband a team of prosecutors who’d been investigating cryptocurrency crimes.
In a memo, deputy attorney general Todd Blanche argued that the “Department of Justice is not a digital assets regulator,” accusing Trump’s predecessor Joe Biden of using the department to “pursue a reckless strategy of regulation by prosecution, which was ill conceived and poorly executed.”
Specifically, the memo calls for the National Cryptocurrency Enforcement Unit (NCET) to be disbanded “effective immediately” to comply with Trump’s January executive order related to digital assets.
The task force was established in 2021, and was made up of prosecutors and attorneys specializing in money laundering and cybercrime.
It has previously investigated shady cryptocurrency “tumblers” or “mixers” that blend crypto funds to obscure their original source, as well as North Korean hackers who assisted in money laundering using crypto.
Trump was once a staunch foe of the crypto industry, but changed his tune after its power players started supporting him financially.
Earlier this month, he issued a pardon to a cryptocurrency exchange that had been fined $100 million for violating an anti-money laundering law. He also recently pardoned Ross Ulbricht, former darknet kingpin of the online marketplace Silk Road.
Trump is also financially tied to the industry, having launched a memecoin as well as a crypto venture.
However, whether the president actually understands how cryptocurrencies work remains unclear at best.
“Crypto is one of those things we have to do,” Trump said during an announcement of the venture in September. “Whether we like it or not, I have to do it.”
Now he’s dismantling mechanisms designed to hold those who exploit cryptocurrencies for fraud responsible.
That’s despite the crypto community seemingly being at odds with how the president has gone about things so far. His memecoin, dubbed TRUMP, proved highly controversial in crypto circles, with some accusing him of “making a mockery of the industry.”
However, other crypto advocates are celebrating the latest move.
“We should be going after bad guys,” advocacy group Coin Center executive director Peter Van Valkenburgh tweeted. “Not the developers of good tools that bad guys happen to use.”
Critics, however, pointed out that Trump is already using digital assets to accumulate wealth with close to zero oversight.
“The president is running a crypto scam where he can receive millions of dollars anonymously,” MSNBC analyst Tim Miller tweeted. “Meanwhile the DOJ has shut down the crypto investigations unit.”
“Truly no corruption scheme like this in our history at least out of the White House,” he added.
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