Bitcoin Seized From Samourai Wallet Has Not Been Sold, White House Says

In brief

• The White House says $6.4 million in seized Samourai Bitcoin was not sold, and will be added to a federal Bitcoin reserve.
• Legal documents suggested the DOJ intended to liquidate the funds, against the spirit of a presidential executive order.
• The Samourai developers remain in prison, and despite Trump signaling openness to pardons, none have been issued.

The nearly $6.4 million worth of Bitcoin seized by federal law enforcement from the creators of privacy tool Samourai Wallet has not been liquidated, and will be added to a national Bitcoin reserve, a White House official said Friday. The announcement follows concerns floated last month by the attorneys and family members of the now-incarcerated developers that rogue Department of Justice attorneys in New York were intent on liquidating the funds. Such a move would have run counter to the spirit of President Donald Trump’s federal Bitcoin reserve, which he established through executive order in March using seized Bitcoin holdings. A signed asset liquidation agreement between federal prosecutors and Samourai developers Keonne Rodriguez and William Lonergan Hill, reviewed by Decrypt, included language that potentially indicated a looming liquidation of the seized funds. 

“Keonne Rodriguez and William Lonergan Hill authorize the USMS to receive the Bitcoin Account and immediately liquidate it in a manner dictated by the USMS,” the November agreement states, referencing the U.S. Marshals Service. “Keonne Rodriguez and William Lonergan Hill authorize the USMS to deposit all funds received from the liquidation of the Bitcoin to the Assets Forfeiture Fund as voluntary payments and for application to their money judgments,” another section reads. But on Friday, Patrick Witt, the executive director of President Trump’s Digital Assets Council, announced the DOJ confirmed to him that the digital assets forfeited by Samourai’s developers “have not been liquidated and will not be liquidated.” The funds, Witt said, will in fact be added to the federal government’s strategic Bitcoin reserve.

UPDATE: we have received confirmation from DOJ that the digital assets forfeited by Samourai Wallet have not been liquidated and will not be liquidated, per EO 14233. They will remain on the USG balance sheet as part of the SBR. https://t.co/v2GchC3vk8

— Patrick Witt (@patrickjwitt) January 16, 2026

Rodriguez and Hill both pleaded guilty last year to one criminal charge of operating an unlicensed money transmitter for their involvement in operating Samourai, a tool that allowed Bitcoin users to make their financial transactions private. The case, started by the Joe Biden DOJ, was continued by the Trump DOJ last year. In November, the Trump DOJ secured a five-year prison sentence against Rodriguez, the maximum possible punishment; Hill was sentenced to four years. Both men have begun serving those sentences as of earlier this month. The case has attracted particular attention among crypto and privacy advocates concerned about its implications for the future development of privacy-related software in the United States. The saga has also caused some friction among crypto advocates’ perception of President Trump, who has made a concerted effort to define himself as “the crypto president” during his second term. Last month, days before Rodriguez was due to report to prison, Decrypt asked the president if he would consider pardoning Samourai’s developers. Trump said he would “look at” the request, and directed Attorney General Pam Bondi to investigate it further. But Rodriguez and Hill reported to federal prison days later, where they remain. In the meantime, allies of the Samourai developers have argued that Manhattan prosecutors were acting in defiance of the White House’s wishes—both by liquidating seized Bitcoin against the intention of a March 2025 executive order establishing a federal Bitcoin reserve, and, potentially, by prosecuting the developers in the first place.

But it appears that Bitcoin was never, in fact, liquidated—regardless of prosecutors’ intentions. Almost a month since the president and the attorney general publicly acknowledged the case, pardons for Rodriguez and Hill have yet to materialize. The odds of a pardon before February sit at just 7.5% on Myriad, a prediction market developed by Decrypt’s parent company Dastan. Even after hearing the White House’s announcement Friday, Rodriguez’s wife, Lauren Emily Rodriguez, told Decrypt she remains skeptical about whether the Assistant U.S. Attorneys in the Samourai case have been forthright about what they did with funds seized from her husband. “After seeing all the lies and manipulations done by the AUSAs in the Samourai case, I wouldn’t put anything past them,” she said.