Crypto & Fintech
The cryptocurrency and fintech industry exploded onto Capitol Hill after FTX's 2022 collapse, with Coinbase, Ripple, and Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) funding the largest single-industry super PAC of the 2024 cycle. Fairshake and its affiliates raised more than $250 million to back crypto-friendly candidates and defeat skeptics like Sen. Sherrod Brown and Rep. Katie Porter. The sector now lobbies aggressively against SEC enforcement, against the agency's classification of most tokens as securities, and for a permissive market-structure bill.
Party Breakdown
Top 10 Recipients
No tracked funding data available for this industry yet.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is Fairshake and how much has it spent?
Fairshake is a network of three super PACs (Fairshake, Defend American Jobs, Protect Progress) funded primarily by Coinbase, Ripple, and Andreessen Horowitz (a16z). Together they raised more than $250 million for the 2024 cycle, making crypto the largest single-industry super PAC operation that year. Fairshake spent heavily to defeat Sen. Sherrod Brown in Ohio and Rep. Katie Porter in California's Senate primary, both seen as crypto skeptics.
What is the industry lobbying for?
Crypto and fintech lobbyists are pushing FIT21 and similar market-structure bills that would shift jurisdiction over most tokens from the SEC to the more permissive CFTC, exempt many digital assets from securities law, and create a federal framework for stablecoins favorable to issuers. They also lobby against the SEC's enforcement actions under Gary Gensler and against rules requiring DeFi protocols to follow KYC/AML standards.
Did FTX-era spending change after Sam Bankman-Fried's conviction?
Bankman-Fried personally donated more than $40 million in 2022 (mostly to Democrats and crypto-aligned candidates) before FTX collapsed and he was convicted of fraud in 2023. The industry's post-FTX response was not to retreat but to consolidate spending through Fairshake, which became more strategic, bipartisan, and focused on primary defeats of skeptics. Total industry political spending is now far higher than it was in the Bankman-Fried era.