Rebecca Ballhaus
Appearances
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
And he felt they got very little credit for it. And the implication was, you know, we're not going to try and necessarily abide by these norms this time around.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
I mean, I think it's important to note that the president is just not bound by the same conflict of interest rules as the rest of the federal government is. He doesn't have to abide by these laws that dictate that you have to avoid participating in something that you have a personal stake in. I didn't realize that.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
Yeah, the president does not have the same requirements of what they have to avoid in terms of conflict. But most presidents other than Trump have sort of taken that very seriously nonetheless. They typically place their assets in a blind trust. They avoid striking new deals while in office.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
But Trump instead has transferred his assets to the control of his children who have continued to pursue these deals.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
I mean, a number of these... deals so far have the potential to have an overlap with the administration's work you know these a settlement with meta which is you know actively seeking a lot from this administration um and whose ceo you know is meeting with trump in the white house there is certainly the potential for overlap there or the expectation of overlap there
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
I think this just sort of takes it one step further, where you're pursuing a business deal with a convicted business venture, with a founder who has pleaded guilty just a little over a year ago, who at the same time is looking for a pardon for those charges. I just think that that's sort of the most acute intertwining of these things that we've seen so far.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
In this administration, I would say, you know, the Trump Organization has been pretty upfront about the fact that they're not going to stop pursuing business deals. But I think the really shocking thing is just this sort of idea of pursuing a business deal as a pardon is also being sought. It certainly creates the appearance of a conflict, even if it's not an exchange of one for the other.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
Binance is a crypto exchange that for years was sort of one of the major exchanges. It was founded by Changpeng Zhao, CZ as he's known, in 2017 in Shanghai. And for years, it was really sort of on the rise, growing incredibly quickly, and was really one of the main competitors in this space.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
So as part of the settlement, Zhao stepped down as CEO, but he remained the majority shareholder. And last year he was sentenced to four months in prison. He was released in September and he's now living in Abu Dhabi.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
So our understanding is that around the time of Trump's election win last fall, Binance began exploring its options for how to return to the US market. It began telling people that it was willing to make a deal with Trump's company and that it wanted to eliminate its legal problems in the US.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
And our understanding is that around that time, it began reaching out to allies of Trump, sort of offering to strike a business deal with the family as part of this plan to return the company to the US.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
Our reporting shows that representatives of Trump's family have held talks to take a financial stake in the U.S. arm of Binance, which is a crypto exchange that in 2023 pleaded guilty and paid a pretty massive fine after it was accused of violating anti-money laundering requirements.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
So our understanding is that they got a pretty good idea for a playbook when they saw what happened in November with Justin's son, according to a person familiar with the discussions.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
In November, Justin Sun, who is a China-born crypto entrepreneur who is facing charges from the SEC, invested $30 million in World Liberty Financial, which is a crypto company that is backed by the Trump family and was launched a couple of months before the election. And, you know, for Sun, we saw that last month the SEC asked a court to pause its fraud case against him.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
And so, you know, it remains to be seen how that will shake out once that 60-day pause is over. And when Binance saw that Sun had made this investment, they thought, you know, that that could be a route for us to go here.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
And so they began considering making a deal with World Liberty Financial or potentially sort of going the same route of a cash infusion in the company in exchange for a pardon for the founder.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
So we know that sometime after they internally discussed whether they should go this Justin Sun route of investing in World Liberty Financial, these talks about a business deal continue. And at some point here, Steve Witkoff, who's a longtime friend of Trump, who also co-founded World Liberty Financial, gets involved in these talks.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
We don't know the exact TikTok of how these talks unfolded and when each person got involved, but we do know that they've continued even since Trump's inauguration, as well as the push for a pardon for CZ.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
The reason that CZ is seeking a pardon, given that he's already served his prison sentence and has been released, is that Binance has wanted for at least several months now to return to the US market. And a pardon would really help him clear the way to do that.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
The other thing a pardon could help with is that it complicates Binance's business in the European Union to have a majority shareholder be a convicted felon. And so were he to be pardoned, it could also sort of ease some hurdles abroad as well.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
So it's a great question because you have to think that, you know, this kind of deal, if it became public, would bring a lot of scrutiny that the Trump family and World Liberty Financial might not be interested in.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
At the same time, I think if they did go forward with a stake in this American arm of Binance and if the Trump family or World Liberty Financial were to have a stake in that, its value is likely to, you know, really increase after returning to the U.S. market. And so for them, it would mean sort of a piece of this pie that is expected to grow if they return to the U.S.,
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
Well, you know, it's not unusual for the Trump organization to pursue deals, including foreign deals. They've been pretty open about that. But what is unusual is, you know, pursuing a deal with a company, first of all, that was convicted of a crime, you know, just over a year ago, but also one whose founder is actively asking for something from the administration.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
It certainly fits with a pattern of the Trump family or representatives of the Trump family pursuing a number of different business ventures while Trump has been in office.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
And so the fact of someone, you know, pushing for an official government action from the president at the same time as accompanies in talks with the president's family or representatives of the president's family is just a pretty striking mixture between official and personal business.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
I would say that since the election, there has been a cash bonanza for the Trump family. So we saw this really sort of ramp up during the transition when Amazon had done a $40 million deal to buy a documentary about Melania Trump's return to the White House. And this was a pretty shocking number because it was the most Amazon had ever paid for a documentary.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
And as we reported last month, it was also three times what the next highest bidder had offered for the documentary. So that was one. The second is that Trump has been pressing the companies that he sued while he was out of office to now settle their lawsuits that he had brought against them. And he's been pretty successful.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
We've seen a handful of major settlements that total, I think about, we're at $50 million so far, much of which is going to Trump's presidential library.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
And then we've seen this meme coin that Trump launched in the days before his inauguration that has already collected hundreds of millions of dollars in trading and other fees that go to entities affiliated with Trump.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
So one thing we heard was that just a couple of weeks ago at Mar-a-Lago, at a private fundraiser for donors who had paid a billion dollars to be there, he was kind of marveling at the ability of a coin like that to bring in potentially billions of dollars. And he actually went around the audience and asked whether they knew what his coin was worth. And the answer he got was that
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
The total market cap at the time was about $13 billion. But so, you know, it's clear that Trump is paying attention to these things.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
And then we really saw him sharply turn during the campaign and especially in 2024 towards the industry and started calling himself the crypto president. But I think there were a couple of factors at play. The first is that I think he saw the potential for fundraising from that industry.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
We know that between his election and his inauguration, he brought in something like $50 million from the industry for his inaugural fund and other committees. And I think he likes the idea of sort of returning the crypto industry to the U.S. and making the U.S., as he has said, the crypto capital of the world.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
And then the SEC, which Trump doesn't directly control, but he certainly appointed regulators who are friendly to the crypto industry. We've seen them drop or pause a dozen lawsuits against crypto companies so far. So, you know, he'd be getting a stake in a crypto company at a time where crypto is thriving in the U.S.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
In an ordinary administration, the family of a president pursuing a business deal like this, particularly in an industry that the president is actively making rules for and sort of doing things that the industry has long wanted, would in any ordinary administration be an enormous scandal.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
Yes, I think it is safe to say that there has been a lot of criticism of his avid pursuit of business deals while in office. But, you know, I think it's also worth noting that the people in the government who would really be in a position to try and do something about this, for example, the head of the Office of Government Ethics, Trump fired soon after becoming president.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
And he's installed a close ally of his in that job. So the number of people within the federal government, or at least within the executive branch, who have the standing to kind of speak out about some of these conflicts, there's a pretty small number of those.
The Journal.
Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance
So you're right that it was a big issue the first time around. But I would say that this administration is so far the first term kind of on steroids when it comes to this stuff. I thought one thing that was really striking was Eric Trump in October, the month before the election, said in an interview with the journal that sort of the first time around, they tried to do everything right.