WASHINGTON — An up-to-date tally of Trump followers turned crypto investors is in. And for them, the overall results are remarkably bad.
Nearly 1 million people who bought President Donald Trump’s meme coin have lost money through the end of June, according to a report by cryptocurrency analytics firm Nansen. Their losses total $3.81 billion.
The analytics firm’s assessment was calculated this past week after Trump signed an annual financial disclosure showing that he walked away with a $636 million payout on the same crypto bet.
The odds were always in his favor. Trump profited whether the price of his meme coin went up or down. He collected returns whenever anyone traded the tokens, as he repeatedly pushed his followers to do, using his Truth Social account to promote the coin.
Once a crypto skeptic, Trump embraced the profit-making opportunity of digital currencies in 2024, while he was running for president. He and his sons founded a crypto startup called World Liberty Financial, which soon began selling a coin called $WLFI that has also declined sharply.
Three days before his inauguration, Trump unveiled a second Trump-branded investment — the $TRUMP meme coin, a type of novelty currency with little practical value.
Most crypto transactions are publicly visible. That allows analysts to trace purchases of digital coins from individual crypto accounts, known as wallets. Nansen’s data shows that, as of the end of June, 988,905 buyers of the $TRUMP meme coin have lost money, representing roughly two out of every three buyers.
Cumulatively, these 988,905 wallets have lost a total of $3.81 billion, including buyers who have held on to their stash and recorded paper losses, according to Nansen. The coin was trading at $1.76 as of Friday, down 97% from its peak price of $75.35.
A little under 500,000 crypto wallets have recorded profits from $TRUMP, totaling $4 billion, according to Nansen. But that figure “reflects a small number of early buyers capturing enormous gains while the broad retail majority absorbed the losses,’’ the report said.
New York Times
Nine who helped bypass emissions systems pardoned
WASHINGTON — President Trump on Friday pardoned 11 people, including a former business partner of Washington lobbyist Jack Abramoff and nine people identified by the White House as having helped people bypass emissions control systems on vehicles.
The acts of clemency come as Trump has issued a slew of pardons in his second term, particularly for allies, public figures and those seen as politically aligned.
His use of the presidency’s sweeping ability to unilaterally grant pardons and commute sentences is among the ways the Republican’s return to office has featured an expansive use of executive power.
Trump earlier on Friday announced some of the pardons on social media, without identifying any of the recipients by name.
“It is my Great Honor to have just signed Pardons for six people who were persecuted by the Biden Administration, and were in, or being sent to, prison, for ‘fixing their car,’’’ Trump wrote on Truth Social.
“I AM SETTING THEM ALL FREE, RIGHT NOW!’’ he said.
In a list provided Friday evening by the White House, Trump pardoned 11 people, including nine who faced charges related to violations of the Clean Air Act by disabling emissions monitoring systems on vehicles or selling devices that enabled emissions systems to be bypassed.
The pardons come after Trump on Monday signed a memo telling the Environmental Protection Agency that Americans can fix their own vehicles as they see fit. As he signed the memo, Trump referenced a diesel mechanic he pardoned last year who disabled emissions monitoring systems.
Beyond the emissions-related pardons, Trump on Friday also issued a pardon for Adam Kidan, a former business partner of Abramoff.
Kidan pleaded guilty in 2005 to fraud and conspiracy related to the purchase of a fleet of gambling boats. He was sentenced to nearly six years in prison.
The case was part of a broader investigation of the early 2000s lobbying scandal involving Abramoff, Capitol Hill, the Interior Department, and members of President George W. Bush’s administration.
After leaving prison in 2009, Kidan began working at a staffing agency, went on to found a staffing business, Chartwell Staffing Solutions, and now serves as president of Empire Workforce Solutions, the White House said.
In March, the newspaper Newsday reported that Kidan was among the hosts of a fundraiser at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort for a Long Island Republican congressional candidate.
Trump on Friday also pardoned ranch owner Jack Harvard, citing an “upstanding record’’ post-conviction and praising him for allowing the US military and NATO troops to train on his land free of charge.
Associated Press
White nationalist group marches on July 4 in D.C.
A large group of masked men wearing the markings of a well-known white nationalist group marched with flags and chanted “reclaim America!’’ in Washington on Saturday morning, as the capital city prepared for the main events celebrating the United States’ 250th birthday.
The march through neighborhoods around the US Capitol, was brief, though bystanders posted scores of videos on social media. The group wore tan baseball hats marked with the logo of the white supremacist group Patriot Front, which includes a ring of 13 white stars, a reference to the first American colonies. They carried various flags, including the Confederate battle flag.
Patriot Front, which has long called for the United States to be turned into a white ethno-state, has a history of staging high-profile demonstrations, almost always in the same uniform of dark shirts, khaki pants, work boots, and white masks.“This definitely looks like Patriot Front,’’ said Mary McCord, a former assistant attorney general for national security under presidents Obama and Trump. She said the logo on their hats, which includes imagery resembling fascist symbols of Italy in the 1930s, was consistent with the group, as was the clothing.
The group — which broke away from another white nationalist organization, Vanguard America, in 2017 after the bloody “Unite the Right’’ rally in Charlottesville, Virginia — has employed the same tactics in different cities. Demonstrators often show up in public spaces in rented U-Hauls, spilling out onto the streets for a flag-waving march before piling back into the trucks and disappearing.
Two summers ago, hundreds of Patriot Front members descended on Nashville, Tennessee, carrying upside-down American flags and causing a major uproar in the city.
New York Times