President Donald Trump dismissed Pam Bondi as attorney general on Thursday and elevated her deputy, Todd Blanche, to lead the Department of Justice. Trump indicated the arrangement may be temporary, with reports suggesting he wants to assess how Blanche performs before making a permanent decision. Blanche previously served as Trump’s personal attorney before joining the federal government.
Blanche’s ascent carries notable implications for the cryptocurrency industry. As the department’s second-highest official, he had already introduced several industry-friendly policy changes, and he is a crypto investor himself. His new role places him at the center of ongoing debates about how aggressively the government should pursue cases involving digital asset developers.
When Blanche entered the DOJ last year, he disclosed holdings of between $100,000 and $250,000 in Bitcoin and between $50,000 and $100,000 in Ethereum, all held through a Coinbase account. He also reported smaller positions in several altcoins, including Solana, Cardano, Ethereum Classic, Polygon, and Polkadot. A subsequent ethics filing stated that he transferred those assets to his adult children and a grandchild.
Shortly after joining the DOJ, Blanche disbanded the department’s dedicated crypto enforcement unit and directed federal prosecutors to ease pressure on crypto exchanges and mixing services. He criticized the previous administration’s approach, saying it had pursued a “reckless strategy of regulation by prosecution, which was ill conceived and poorly executed.” A senior DOJ official later told crypto policy leaders that the department would stop charging software developers with operating unlicensed money transmitters.
Despite those assurances, enforcement actions against crypto developers continued. Last fall, the Trump-era DOJ sent two Bitcoin privacy software developers to prison on money transmitter charges. In a separate case, an Ethereum developer named Roman Storm was convicted by a Manhattan jury of operating an illegal money transmitter, though jurors deadlocked on two additional counts. Last month, under Blanche and Bondi’s leadership, federal prosecutors moved to retry Storm on those remaining charges.
Peter Van Valkenburgh, executive director of crypto policy think tank Coin Center, told Decrypt that the combination of pro-crypto rhetoric and continued prosecutions has left the industry in “a very bad state.” The apparent contradiction between public statements and courtroom actions has unsettled privacy and decentralization advocates who had hoped for a clear policy shift. Whether Blanche’s promotion will produce a more consistent approach remains uncertain.
The question of pardons for convicted crypto developers also lingers. In December, Trump told Decrypt he would “look at” the possibility of pardoning software developers convicted under his own Justice Department, but no pardons have been issued since. It is unclear whether the policies that led to those convictions were driven primarily by Bondi or reflect a broader departmental stance that Blanche may or may not alter now that he holds the top position.
Originally reported by Decrypt.
