At Bitcoin 2025, Crypto Purists and the MAGA Faithful Collide

Now that Trump is in office, launching his own crypto ventures and asking for legislation establishing (light) digital asset regulations to appear on his desk by August, his supporters’ voices drown out those of the bitcoiners who warn how abandoning crypto’s principles could endanger their community.

“Trying to [politicize bitcoin] is really dangerous for everybody, because the message of what bitcoin does … gets glossed over [as it becomes] this tool for the Republican Party,” says Erik Cason, author of the book Cryptosovereignty.

In a panel titled “Are Bitcoiners Becoming Sycophants of the State,” he elaborates to a crowd on the conference floor: “The amount of dick-sucking going on towards the political establishment here is shameful and disgusting,” he says. “You can own bitcoin today and exit from this fucked-up establishment that’s designed to steal from you and redistribute that money towards war and horror.”

Among resounding cheers, an older man stands up and pumps his fist in agreement. A man behind him slaps his leg emphatically.

Politicians “need us more than we need them,” Bruce Fenton, founder and CEO of fintech company Chainstone Labs, continues. “We should refuse meetings with them … We’ve invented nerd money that they can’t stop with all their tanks.”

Not only is the state dangerous as a vehicle of war, they say; it’s also risky to align with one political party, because it could provoke a reactionary backlash. Next time Democrats take over, Cason fears, they’ll “go after bitcoin and crypto hard.”

Bitcoiners “need to understand that we’re our own political contingency now, and pandering to either side is a massive disservice,” he tells me after the conference. “Bitcoin isn’t for the right or the left. It’s for the bottom, not the top.”

Bitcoin purists might have hoped for vocal support from Ross Ulbricht, the former operator of the dark-web market Silk Road (where users could use bitcoin to buy drugs). Ulbricht became a symbol for crypto operating unburdened by the state’s rules when he was sentenced to life in prison in 2015. Trump pardoned him earlier this year.

Ulbricht’s freedom has been such a key issue for the bitcoin community that David Bailey, CEO of BTC Inc, which organized Bitcoin 2025, made sure to communicate to Trump during the 2024 campaign how high priority pardoning Ulbricht was for his voting bloc. But Ulbricht’s appearance at the conference is paradoxical: His anti-state sentiment has been sanctioned by the very state he wanted to bypass.

“The impression people have is that bitcoiners just care about money,” Ulbricht’s mother, Lyn, who’s been attending the Bitcoin Conference for years working to free her son, tells me, “but many are idealistic and caring.” A movement of donors and activists large and small in the bitcoin, crypto, and Libertarian communities got her son out of prison, she says.

When Ulbricht walks onto the main stage, lanky and self-assured in a long, red tie, he doesn’t thank Trump directly (he’s “thankful that we elected him”). Nor does he thank Bailey for his advocacy, or even his mother for her tireless efforts. He thanks the audience, whom he urges to “stay true to our principles”—freedom, decentralization, and, he stresses, unity. “It’s more important than ever,” he says, as bitcoin’s popularity spreads.