President Donald Trump has pardoned Changpeng Zhao, the billionaire founder of the crypto exchange Binance, in a move that reflects the administration’s business-friendly approach to digital currencies.
“President Trump exercised his constitutional authority by issuing a pardon for Mr. Zhao, who was prosecuted by the Biden Administration in their war on cryptocurrency,” White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said in a statement on Thursday.
“In their desire to punish the cryptocurrency industry, the Biden Administration pursued Mr. Zhao despite no allegations of fraud or identifiable victims,” Leavitt said in the statement, which declared the Biden administration’s “war on crypto” to be over.
Zhao, known as “CZ,” pleaded guilty to violating anti-money laundering requirements tied to Binance and was sentenced to four months in prison before he was released last year.
At the time of his 2023 guilty plea, Zhao stepped down from his role as CEO of Binance. The cryptocurrency exchange also admitted it engaged in anti-money laundering and agreed to pay over $4 billion to resolve the Justice Department’s investigation.
Then-US Attorney General Merrick Garland at the time said the fee marked “one of the largest corporate penalties in U.S. history.” Binance, he said, “became the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange in part because of the crimes it committed.”
Leavitt, in her statement, said the Biden administration “sought to imprison Mr. Zhao for three years, a sentence so outside Sentencing Guidelines that the [sic] even the Judge said he had never heard of this in his 30-year career.”
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“These actions by the Biden Administration severely damaged the United States’ reputation as a global leader in technology and innovation,” the White House spokeswoman said. “The Biden Administration’s war on crypto is over.”
Attorneys for Zhao did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
A spokesperson for Binance called Zhao’s pardon “incredible news” and thanked Trump “for his leadership and for his commitment to make the US the crypto capital of the world.”
“CZ’s vision not only made Binance the world’s largest crypto exchange but shaped the broader crypto movement,” the spokesperson told Business Insider in a statement. “Binance remains focused on building a secure, transparent, and user-first platform that reduces fees and increases access to the financial system for all.”
While the Trump administration is declaring the war on crypto over when it comes to the business side of things, the president’s Department of Justice continues to crack down on what it views as individual bad actors in the space, including two MIT-educated brothers who are on trial in Manhattan federal court.
