Sam Bankman-Fried opened up his wallet to Washington in a big way during the 2022 election cycle, donating about $40 million publicly.
So which politicians got money from the founder and former CEO of collapsed cryptocurrency exchange FTX?
MarketWatch has compiled an interactive list below of the candidates and committees who received funds from Bankman-Fried based on the latest disclosures to the Federal Election Commission.
Overall, he gave almost all of the $40 million to Democratic politicians or groups, and just over $200,000 to Republicans, according to the disclosures.
In a wide-ranging interview at the New York Times Dealbook Summit last week, Bankman-Fried said donations were made to candidates who voiced support for pandemic prevention.
At least two Democratic senators received over $20,000 each from Bankman-Fried through joint political action committees tied to their candidacies. Those are Michigan’s Debbie Stabenow and New Hampshire’s Maggie Hassan. New York Democratic Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand got at least $10,000. Gillibrand is the co-sponsor of a crypto bill that would have the Commodity Futures Trading Commission oversee bitcoin, ether and most other digital assets and give a secondary regulatory role to the Securities and Exchange Commission.
In the wake of FTX’s collapse, politicians have been saying they will donate or have donated the money that they received from SBF to charities or other groups, or they’re giving it back.
Gillibrand spokesman Evan Lukaske said the senator donated her funds to Ariva Inc., a Bronx-based nonprofit that offers free financial counseling. Stabenow, whose own bill empowering the CFTC to regulate crypto was backed by Bankman-Fried, plans to donate the contributions to a local charity. A representative for Sen. Hassan did not respond to requests for comment.
Related: ‘Bedazzled by money’: Democratic ties to Sam Bankman-Fried under scrutiny after FTX collapse
While 50 Democratic House and Senate candidates received donations, only eight Republican Senate candidates received money from the former CEO.
SBF — known for being a Democratic megadonor — has claimed he made contributions that don’t show up in FEC disclosures. He told video blogger Tiffany Fong that he donated as much to Republicans as he did to Democrats, but the GOP donations were “dark-money” contributions, making his claim difficult to verify. Such secret contributions, allowed by the Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United ruling, wouldn’t show up in the FEC disclosures used to compile MarketWatch’s list.
Another FTX exec, Ryan Salame, became known as a Republican megadonor earlier this year, with a MarketWatch analysis in October finding that he publicly gave about $17 million to GOP groups.
Use our interactive below to search through donations as reported to the FEC.
Donations also filtered into committees associated with Bankman-Fried himself — Guarding Against Pandemics and GMI PAC.
MarketWatch’s Victor Reklaitis contributed to this story.
