Ron DeSantis, the Republican Governor of Florida and presidential candidate, has promised to end the Biden Administration’s war on Bitcoin (BTC) and cryptocurrencies if he is elected President. At a Monday campaign event in New Hampshire, DeSantis declared, “Biden’s war on Bitcoin and cryptocurrency will come to an end when I am president. We are going to allow Americans to invest in things like Bitcoin and cryptocurrency. No one is forcing you to do it, if you want to do it, you can do it.”
The Biden Administration has recently brought charges against crypto exchanges such as Coinbase and Binance, though the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is an independent agency from the government. President Biden has not taken any direct action on the crypto industry, instead guiding regulatory agencies to study it and come up with ways to oversee the sector. DeSantis has accused Biden of pushing for a digital dollar, though the Biden Administration has yet to take a position on issuing a central bank digital currency.
DeSantis has used the issue of digital assets to draw attention to the differences between his pro-crypto views and former President Donald Trump’s past skepticism. Despite this, a recent New York Times/Siena College poll showed DeSantis trailing Trump’s 54% to 17% among likely Republican voters.