{"id":4173,"date":"2025-11-05T06:35:08","date_gmt":"2025-11-05T06:35:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/marketsfortress.com\/index.php\/2025\/11\/05\/trump-says-he-knows-nothing-about-the-crypto-billionaire-he-pardoned\/"},"modified":"2025-11-05T06:35:08","modified_gmt":"2025-11-05T06:35:08","slug":"trump-says-he-knows-nothing-about-the-crypto-billionaire-he-pardoned","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/marketsfortress.com\/index.php\/2025\/11\/05\/trump-says-he-knows-nothing-about-the-crypto-billionaire-he-pardoned\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump says he knows ‘nothing’ about the crypto billionaire he pardoned"},"content":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON \u2014 President Donald Trump on Sunday said he did not know anything about Changpeng Zhao, the billionaire crypto exchange founder with close ties to the Trump family\u2019s own crypto empire \u2014 despite the fact that he he pardoned him <\/a>last month. <\/p>\n

“I don’t know who he is<\/a>,” Trump said when asked on CBS’s “60 Minutes” why he pardoned him.<\/p>\n

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\u201cI can only tell you this. My sons are into it,\u201d Trump added. \u201cI\u2019m glad they are, because it\u2019s probably a great industry, crypto. I think it\u2019s good.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI know nothing about the guy,\u201d Trump said again when pressed.<\/p>\n

He claimed that Zhao, also known as \u201cCZ,\u201d was the victim of the \u201cweaponization\u201d of the Justice Department, without providing further details. <\/strong>At the time of the guilty plea deal, federal prosecutors said Zhao caused \u201csignificant harm to US national security.\u201d<\/p>\n

Trump\u2019s acknowledgement that he knows very little about one of his own pardon recipients comes as the president and his Republican allies continue to attack former President Joe Biden, claiming that he wasn’t aware of many of his official acts as president \u2014 including pardons \u2014 because his staff used an autopen signature<\/a>. <\/p>\n

“I guarantee you he knew nothing about what he was signing<\/a>, I guarantee you,” Trump said in July.<\/p>\n

The Republican-led House Oversight Committee last month called some of Biden\u2019s executive actions, including pardons, \u201cillegitimate<\/a>.\u201d On his way out of office, Biden issued a number of pre-emptive pardons for prominent Democrats and his own family members<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Biden has called the Republican allegations “ridiculous and false<\/a>.” Past presidents, including Trump, have, at times, used an autopen signature; Trump has maintained that it wasn’t for anything important.<\/p>\n

The White House did not return a request for comment.<\/p>\n

\"Changpeng
Changpeng Zhao received a pardon from Trump in October.<\/span>Stephen McCarthy \/ Sportsfile for Web Summit via Getty Images<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Zhao, who founded the Binance crypto exchange, was sentenced to four months in prison<\/a> as part of a 2023 deal with the Justice Department that required he plead guilty to helping enable money laundering at his exchange, which also has a business relationship with World Liberty Financial. That firm was co-founded by the president\u2019s sons Eric and Donald Trump Jr., and has administered many of crypto projects tied to the president\u2019s family.<\/p>\n

As part of the deal, Binance was ordered to pay $4 billion in fines, while Zhao personally paid $50 million in fines and issued an apology. He continues to hold a major stake in the exchange. <\/p>\n

World Liberty Financial\u2019s main crypto coin runs on an exchange that Binance administers, The Wall Street Journal has previously reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Trump was asked during the “60 Minutes” interview about the potential conflict of interest of him pardoning someone in a direct business relationship with his family. He responded he knew nothing about the issue.<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, here\u2019s the thing, I know nothing about it because I\u2019m too busy doing the other\u2014\u201d Trump responded, before being interrupted and pressed further.<\/p>\n

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Because of the sweeping nature of the financial crimes and the direct entanglements with Trump\u2019s family, the pardon received quick pushback, including from some Republicans. Outgoing Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., at the time called it a \u201cbad signal.<\/a>\u201d<\/p>\n

A Biden spokesperson declined to comment on Trump’s latest remarks, but pointed NBC News to a social media post by former Biden spokesperson Andrew Bates, who posed a question that Republicans increasingly asked during Biden’s term in office.<\/p>\n

\u201cWho\u2019s running the White House?\u201d he posted<\/a> in direct response to a story about Trump claiming not to know who Zhao was.<\/p>\n

On Monday morning, House Speaker Mike Johnson, who has been among those critical of Biden, brushed off questions about Trump\u2019s pardon admission.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know anything about it<\/a>,\u201d he told reporters.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON \u2014 President Donald Trump on Sunday said he did not know anything about Changpeng Zhao, the billionaire crypto exchange founder with close ties to the Trump family\u2019s own crypto empire \u2014 despite the fact that he he pardoned him last month. “I don’t know who he is,” Trump said when asked on CBS’s “60 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":4174,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-4173","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/marketsfortress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4173","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/marketsfortress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/marketsfortress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marketsfortress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4173"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/marketsfortress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4173\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marketsfortress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4174"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/marketsfortress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4173"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marketsfortress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4173"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marketsfortress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4173"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}