Beyond The Soundbite: Unpacking Elizabeth Warren's Anti-Crypto Crusade

Elizabeth Warren, the American senior senator representing Massachusetts, is rallying the US Congress and her supporters to a cause: the ban on cryptocurrency on the US soil.

Of all the anti-crypto US politicians alive, Warren is probably the most famous, the most consistent and the most controversial critic, whose criticisms indubitably emanated from crypto’s unending sea of troubles.

Warren's abhorrence for crypto and everything it stands for runs deep, with much of it stemming from her philippics about its role in money-laundering, and terror financing.

Cryptocurrency, as Warren would have us believe, is an affliction that must be stopped at all cost and to do so she is currently leading a campaign at the US Congress to systematically undermine and, if possible, ban it altogether.

By being a consistent and thorough-going anti-crypto advocate, she has successfully gained support from other senators who share her concerns, despite evidence showing there is more crime committed in traditional finance than in the crypto industry.

In the last year or so, the 74 year old senator and her cohorts have been increasingly concerned by the fact that millions of American adults have stacked up all the various forms of ‘internet money’, from Bitcoin to Dogecoin, with nothing that is practically backing them’.

In her latest attack on the crypto industry, she notably stated that “if you are in crypto, you are a criminal”. In a similar move, she recently aimed her criticism at Coinbase, the largest crypto exchange in the US,as well as the Blockchain Association and the Coin Center, two leading players, in a letter requesting an explanation on their employment of the nation’s former law enforcement and defense officials.

While Warren continues to seek the public’s support in her campaign against cryptocurrency, not a single one of her criticisms has gone unchecked.

In October following the Hamas terrorist attack on Israel , she rallied 104 lawmakers to a signed bipartisan letter to the Department of The Treasury, expressing ‘grave concerns’ over how Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad raised millions of dollars in crypto–undetected.

Contesting this claim, Elliptic, a popular crypto research and analysis firm, quickly put out a statement debunking the Wall Street Journal’s report( which the lawmakers cited) as totally false and misleading, dealing a fatal blow to the million dollar funding claim that Senator Warren and her supporters had relied on.

With the same fervor that was poured into criticizing ‘Hamas terror financing’, Warren also called out key actors in the US crypto space for allegedly “spending millions of dollars to give itself a veneer of legitimacy”. In other words, she described the employment of top defense and law enforcement experts as crypto lobbying and called it an ‘abuse of the revolving door’.

“Congress and the public deserve transparency about the extent to which crypto firms are using revolving door practices fighting efforts to close holes in current anti-money laundering and terrorist finance laws,” wrote Senator Warren.  

Reacting to the weighty allegations, Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong accused Senator Warren and his cohorts of working with top American banks to introduce a tougher anti -crypto bill. In the same vein, CoinCenter described Warren's letter as ‘a bullying publicity stunt’.

Rating Senator Warren

New information has revealed that Senator Warren is the most outspoken anti-crypto American politician alive. According to Stand With Crypto Alliance, she's  “strongly against” cryptocurrency trends on account of its illicit use.

As of the time of writing, Warren has 12 senators co-sponsoring her new bill with her longtime associate Sen. Roger Marshall as the lead co-sponsor. Judging by these credentials, she is more a formidable crypto opponent than the SEC Chair Gary Gensler or any influential politician in the country.

Warren’s critics usually acknowledge her concerns. But all the credits that criticizing cryptocurrency has earned her are overshadowed by the echoes of the McCarthy era that they have found in several of her anti-crypto speeches and letters.

A Genuine Concern Or a Mere Lip Service?

In trying to understand the motivation of Warren's unyielding anti-crypto stance, one must not forget that she's a politician with a propensity to sway public opinion, and true to form,Warren has, in the last one year, done more to convince the American public that cryptocurrency is a “threat in disguise”.

Moreover, given the customary political behavior of politicians to curry favour with the electorate, some critics are quick to say that Warren’s call for crypto oversight and regulation is deeply rooted in her 2024 political ambition.

Criticizing Senator Warren always swings from overegging the pudding to turning a blind eye to the high crime rate in traditional finance. Despite the abundance of evidence showing crypto's crimes pale in comparison to those of traditional finance, Warren has continued to double down on her anti-crypto campaign and she has remained unapologetic about it.