Sam Bankman-Fried padded the pockets of many politicians and American businesses. In a rare story of common sense prevailing, one Texas politician smelled foul play early. Before FTX crashed, Texas politician Beto O’Rourke declined $1-Million Dollars from the world’s most charitable billionaire.
The donation arrived at the gubernatorial campaign party of O’Rourke on October 11th, a Tuesday.
Beto O’Rorke Didn’t Know Sam Bankman-Fried
The 7-figure sum obviously shocked the former Congressman and his team, but there was one problem — No one from the party Sam Bankman-Fried.
One-million-dollars is not something a legitimate businessman sends out before building a rapport with a political candidate. This raised red flags all around the massive sum and its donor.
“This contribution was unsolicited and the campaign’s upcoming report [for Texas Ethics Commission] will show that it was returned back on November 4,” said Chris Evans, a spokesperson for O’Rourke’s campaign crew.
Evans makes it clear with that statement that O’Rourke, who was a candidate for Texas Governor and former Congressman, is not willing to accept money from unknown entities.
He then continued, “[this was returned] prior to the news stories that would later come out about the donor.”
Largest Donation Made To Tx Democrat’s Campaign
The $1-Million-Dollar check was the largest donation made to Beto O’Rourke’s gubernatorial campaign. But still, as the old saying goes, ‘all money is not good money.’ The 50-year-old former US Representative for Texas’ 16th congressional district, graciously declined the donation.
It’s not clear how Sam Bankman-Fried got the contacts of O’Rourke. The donation was unsolicited and many speculate the disgraced FTX co-founder was doing so in an attempt to build enough political connections and power to avoid jail.
Regardless for O’Rourke, his campaigning still raised $77-Million-Dollars. At least three of his other donors also sent in a million dollars. That list of donors includes billionaire investor George Soros, who once made $1-Billion dollars in a single day in 1992.
In total, Sam Bankman-Fried donated $40-Million to various Democrats.
FTX Executive Ryan Salame donated $23-Million to Republicans.
Joel Biden Got Millions from SBF
SBF gave $5-Million to President Joel Biden’s campaign in 2020.
Beto O’Rourke lost the race for Texas Governor to Greg Abbott. The current Tx Governor encouraged all political figures who took money from the millions FTX and its employees sent out to return it.
On twitter he wrote, “Candidates who received this tainted money should return it so that innocent customers of FTX can get some of their money back.”
Unfortunately, with FTX currently going through a Chapter 11 bankruptcy and having upward of 17,000 potential creditors, the funds would not resolve all debt accrued. The failed crypto-exchange is believed to owe $3-billion-dollars at least, if not more. A major portion of that debt being with crypto-lender BlockFi, who’s owed $1-Billion in collateral assets.
