Celebrating 250 years of America! Trump plans to pardon 250 people, will FTX and Tornado founders be selected?

U.S. President Trump is reportedly considering a 250-person pardon plan, drawing attention from the crypto community. The market is abuzz about whether developers of privacy-disputed mixer protocols and figures such as SBF might be included on the list.

Trump’s “250-person pardon plan” draws intense attention in the crypto community

According to a report by The Wall Street Journal, U.S. President Trump is considering pushing a large-scale pardon program during the 250th anniversary of the founding of the United States, which is expected to pardon about 250 offenders. After the news was revealed, the cryptocurrency industry also began discussing it—whether crypto industry figures involved in major cases in recent years could have a chance of being added to the pardon list.

At present, the most talked-about figures in the market include Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF), the FTX founder who has already been convicted, as well as parties involved in cases related to privacy protocols such as Tornado Cash co-founders Roman Storm and Alexey Pertsev. Since Trump has continued to send favorable signals to the crypto industry over the past year, some supporters have started to speculate whether the White House might re-examine certain crypto-related cases.

When Trump recently discussed pardon plans with his aides, he mentioned the desire to echo the symbolic significance of the 250th anniversary of the nation’s founding through a “250-person pardon,” but the White House has not yet announced an official list.

The Tornado Cash case continues to unfold, and the crypto community rallies behind the developers

Among all the potential candidates being discussed, the Tornado Cash-related case has drawn special attention from the crypto community. Some crypto supporters believe that the U.S. government’s recent enforcement actions against Tornado Cash developers involve a core question: whether “code is speech.”

Tornado Cash is an Ethereum-based privacy-mixing protocol. The U.S. Department of the Treasury previously accused North Korea’s Lazarus Group of laundering money using the tool, and therefore imposed sanctions on the protocol. However, the crypto community and some developers have long criticized the idea that the U.S. government directly equates open-source code development with criminal activity, which could have a chilling effect on the overall open-source software industry.

So far, Tornado Cash co-founder Roman Storm continues to face U.S. legal proceedings, while a Dutch court has already issued a ruling regarding another developer, Alexey Pertsev. Many crypto supporters believe that if Trump truly pushes a large-scale pardon, crypto privacy cases could become a concrete, symbolic political issue.

• Related news: The Tornado Cash sanctions case ends! The U.S. Treasury drops the appeal, and TORN jumps more than 5% on the news

Could SBF be pardoned? The market reacts in two directions

Compared with the Tornado Cash developers’ case—which involves technical and open-source controversy—SBF’s situation as the founder of FTX is even more sensitive. SBF was previously convicted on multiple charges including fraud, misappropriation of customer assets, and financial crimes, and is viewed as one of the most representative financial scandals in the crypto industry.

Some people in the market believe the likelihood of SBF receiving a pardon is relatively low, because the FTX incident involved a large number of victims and immense political pressure. In particular, the SBF case dealt a major blow to trust among U.S. retail customers and institutional investors, and it has also prompted U.S. regulators to accelerate tough enforcement actions against the crypto industry.

• Related news: Trump had no mercy in the face of the FTX scandal—he said no pardon; SBF’s appeal hopes are officially dashed

However, some supporters also believe that in the past, Trump has repeatedly used pardons to convey political symbolism. Whether he will package certain crypto cases into examples of “excessive government regulation” remains a subject of debate.

Crypto regulation is gradually becoming a focal point of political struggle in the U.S.

Trump’s attitude toward cryptocurrencies has clearly changed over the past year. In addition to publicly supporting Bitcoin mining and innovation in digital assets, during the campaign he also actively sought funding and support from the crypto industry. The current stance within the Republican Party toward cryptocurrencies is also gradually forming a sharp contrast with the Democratic Party.

As the U.S. presidential election draws closer, issues related to the crypto industry are rapidly becoming politicized. Topics such as crypto regulation, privacy tools, and financial freedom are also gradually shifting from technology and financial matters into part of the political struggle in the U.S.