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A list of attendees at President Donald Trump’s private cryptocurrency dinner has yet to be released. So Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) started to track a handful of them down.
Trump invited the top 220 investors of his $TRUMP meme coin to an exclusive event at his Virginia golf club Thursday night, which has drawn criticism from Democrats and protesters who held signs including “America is not for sale” outside of the dinner. White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said on Thursday that Trump would be attending the event in his “personal time” when asked by a reporter about the American public being able to see who is “paying for that access.”
The contest pooled in around a collective $148 million, with buyers on top of the leaderboard gaining an ‘EXCLUSIVE’ invitation to Trump’s “unforgettable gala DINNER,” according to the meme coin’s website.
“Heading to the Crypto Dinner in Loudon County, Virginia, in a little while,” Trump posted on his social media platform Truth Social. “The U.S.A. is DOMINATING in Crypto, Bitcoin, etc., and we are going to keep it that way!”
In a thread of posts on X, Blumenthal detailed some of the attendees who he said are “competing to line his pockets to buy access to the President.”
His first post spotlighted Justin Sun, a cryptocurrency billionaire who WSJ exclusively reported feared for his arrest in the U.S. Sun had confirmed in his own post on X that he was the top holder of $TRUMP.
WSJ also reported that Sun’s company Tron was “growing in popularity among illicit actors,” citing a private 2023 report from the U.S. Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network.
Blumenthal had quoted an X post from Sun that included a video edit of his arrival at the dinner.
“Really nice to be here today with like everybody in the crypto to witness this great moment of crypto, and the president will be on the stage later,” Sun said in the video.
The senator then mentioned “ICE,” a pseudonym for one of the co-founders of MemeCore, which describes itself as a “playground” for meme coins.
“‘Fight, Fight, Fight.’ $TRUMP,” ICE posted on their X account, with a bio declaring them in second place on the leaderboard. “We finally met… It was truly an honor.”
Blumenthal also highlighted Sheldon Xia, the founder of BitMart, a cryptocurrency asset exchange based in the Cayman Islands. Xia posted several photos of the dinner on his X account, and replied to a post of the president dancing to “YMCA.”
The senator moved to investor “Ogle” as his last attendee, who posted a picture on X with the caption “An historic evening for crypto and the USA.”
“...“Ogle” has worked as an advisor for Trump’s crypto venture World Liberty Financial—a company I have launched a PSI inquiry into following reporting that the firm may be enabling the violation of government ethics requirements,” Blumenthal wrote.
He concluded the thread: “Foreign governments & shady figures have figured out how to get to Trump: through his wallet. As he auctions off access to himself & his office, Trump becomes beholden to foreign power through private benefits—all while selling out the American public.”
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