Sam Bankman-Fried speaks out on politics and appeal in interview from prison

The founder of defunct cryptocurrency exchange FTX, Sam Bankman-Fried, has spoken out about politics in his first interview since being behind bars.

The FTX founder was sentenced to 25 years in prison in March 2024, with the interview taking place through a telephone line from Brooklyn’s Metropolitan Detention Center to New York The Sun.

The 32-year-old is awaiting a transfer to a federal prison and the full tapes of the recording have been released from the publisher.

Within it, he’s described as having spoken in a ‘contemplative tone’ as he reflects on what had happened. He told the publisher that his case is touched by the same “prosecutorial abuse” and “politicization of the DOJ” alleged on the campaign trail by President Trump.

His lawyers have appealed to the Second United States Appeals Circuit, arguing that he “was never presumed innocent. He was presumed guilty – before he was even charged. He was presumed guilty by the media.

“He was presumed guilty by the FTX debtor estate and its lawyers. He was presumed guilty by federal prosecutors eager for quick headlines. And he was presumed guilty by the judge,” as reported by the publisher.

EXCLUSIVE: Has Sam Bankman-Fried had a political awakening, or is this a tactical maneuver given that a pardon from President Trump may be his last resort? https://t.co/KJwjPsep3x

— The New York Sun (@NewYorkSun) February 21, 2025

Bankman-Fried also told the Sun that he believes he hasn’t been given a “fair and balanced” pass through the legal system and that the “story the jury was told” by Ms. Sassoon and her office “was false.”

The founder also appears to have had a change of political opinion, as he would have once described himself as being on the center-left of the political flag. Now, however, he has said that the “Republican party was far more reasonable” in regards to the matter of regulating crypto currencies.

Previously, the founder had been the second most generous donor to Joe Biden’s election campaign in 2020. Despite this, he told the Sun that before FTX imploded “he had been giving to Republicans conservative causes a lot more than had been public” and that he had “been working with Republicans a lot more than had been previously thought.”

Featured Image: AI-generated via Ideogram

The post Sam Bankman-Fried speaks out on politics and appeal in interview from prison appeared first on ReadWrite.