Since US President Donald Trump’s AI and crypto czar, David Sacks, announced plans for the White House to host a summit featuring industry leaders and policymakers, many are questioning what the focus of the event will be.
On March 7, according to Sacks, “prominent founders, CEOs, and investors from the crypto industry” will meet with members of Trump’s working group on digital assets at the White House, presumably to discuss policy issues related to crypto and blockchain and a potential regulatory framework. The announcement preceded the US president’s intention to include XRP (XRP), Solana (SOL) and Cardano (ADA) in a crypto strategic stockpile being explored by the working group.
Among the individuals confirmed to be attending the White House event are Trump, Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse, Strategy executive chairman Michael Saylor, Chainlink co-founder Sergey Nazarov, Exodus CEO JP Richardson, Sacks, and working group executive director Bo Hines.
Garlinghouse supported Trump’s presidential campaign personally and helped “pro-crypto” lawmakers through Ripple’s donations to the political action committee Fairshake, leading some to speculate that other donors — including Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong, Gemini co-founders Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss and Kraken co-founder Jesse Powell — might also attend the summit.
Source: Michael Saylor
Since taking office in January, Trump and Republican lawmakers have proposed establishing a strategic crypto reserve, banning central bank digital currencies, and studying a comprehensive digital asset regulatory framework. The US Securities and Exchange Commission under Trump has also dropped investigations and enforcement actions against many firms involving digital assets.
Crypto policies, EOs and laws under Trump
Some Republican lawmakers in the 119th session of Congress have already moved forward on crypto-related legislative priorities by proposing competing stablecoin bills. However, some Democratic lawmakers have used hearings to criticize Trump for launching his own controversial memecoin in January prior to taking office — a project whose team continues to earn millions of dollars from trading fees.
Related: Public Citizen accuses Trump of ‘soliciting’ gifts with memecoin posts
Though many leaders in the crypto industry have testified during congressional hearings, the summit appears to be the first large gathering of digital asset executives at the White House. Former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried reportedly met with officials in the Biden administration in 2022.
At the time of publication, there were no additional details available regarding the crypto summit’s agenda. Cointelegraph reached out to the White House and Hines for comment but did not receive a response at the time of publication.
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