Blockchain
Kamala Harris’ Campaign Seeks ‘Reset’ With Cryptocurrency Firms
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Kamala Harris’s advisers have turned to major cryptocurrency firms to “repair” relations between her Democratic Party and an industry that has emerged as a major backer of Donald Trump, her rival for the US presidency.
Members of the vice president’s team have reached out to people close to him Encrypt companies to meet in recent days, four people familiar with the matter said. They include major exchange Coinbase, stablecoin firm Circle and blockchain payments group Ripple Labs, two of the people said.
The Office of the Vice President and the Harris campaign declined to comment. Ripple and Coinbase declined to comment. Circle did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Harris’s openness to cryptocurrency firms comes as Trump enjoys strong support levels industry. The former president, once a staunch cryptocurrency skeptic, has thrown his weight behind the industry and will deliver the keynote address at a Bitcoin conference in Nashville on Saturday.
Cryptocurrency groups are likely to be a major source of funding for election candidates: Pro-crypto super PAC Fairshake has raised more than $200 million from backers including Coinbase, Ripple and Andreessen Horowitz, according to filings.
People advising Harris’s campaign on business matters said the decision to reconnect with the cryptocurrency industry had little to do with attracting new campaign contributions. Instead, they said the goal was to build a constructive relationship that would ultimately establish a smart regulatory framework that would help the entire asset class grow.
Outside advisers to the campaign said Harris wanted to change the perception among many senior American leaders that Democrats were anti-business. One person said her campaign was using the leadership shift on the Democratic ticket as an opportunity to repair relations with the tech industry, which had felt targeted by the Biden administration, particularly on antitrust issues.
The underlying message Harris wants to convey is that Democrats are “pro-business, responsible business,” said a person close to her campaign.
Harris is aiming to win back those in the tech community, many of them in her home state of California, who have abandoned the party to protest the threat of new taxes or regulations on their industry.
This month, venture capitalists Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz announced they would back Trump in the election, having previously backed several Democratic candidates. Their firm, Andreessen Horowitz, claims to be the world’s largest crypto investor and has raised about $8 billion to invest in the sector.
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When they announced their support for Trump, the two venture capitalists lashed out at Joe Biden’s White House and Gary Gensler’s Securities and Exchange Commission. “They’ve just fought us every step of the way, and they’ve done it very nefariously,” Horowitz said at the time. “They’re bombing the industry.”
Some cryptocurrency firms are hoping Harris will be more sympathetic to them. “The fact that she’s willing to listen is a big deal. You couldn’t even get a meeting with Biden… She’s left people with a very bad opinion of the Biden administration,” said one cryptocurrency firm executive.