Sam Bankman-Fried Aimed to Outpace George Soros as Largest Democrat Donor

Disgraced former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried tried to build a political empire to rival Democrat megadonor George Soros.

Puck News reporter Theodore Schleifer wrote that Bankman-Fried personally bought a Democrat startup, Deck, spending roughly $4 to $5 million to buy out the existing investors to the Democrat analytics firm. Bankman-Fried reportedly heard about the startup from Mind the Gap, a Democrat donor network founded by his mother, Barbara Bankman-Fried.

The purchase of Deck served as Bankman-Fried’s political scheme to be the “biggest donor in the Democratic Party,” even outshining Democrat megadonor.

Bankman-Fried and Ryan Salame, co-CEO of FTX Digital Markets, served as two of the largest donors to Republicans and Democrats last cycle. Bankman-Fried fell just below Soros as the largest Democrat donor.

In all, Bankman-Fried donated roughly $40 million to Democrat politicians and PACs, while Salame gave about $23 million to Republicans and PACs supporting the GOP.

Puck News wrote that the former FTX CEO sought advisers and conducted data experiments to help Democrats in the 2024 election cycle:

I have previously reported that S.B.F.’s team was actively looking for future advisors to join them in drafting “plays” for the 2024 cycle, and that one of those ideas was to fund some more progressive organizations, for instance. Some of those plans were already underway. I have learned in recent days that S.B.F. was already quietly funding some experiments across the Democratic ecosystem, such as randomized-controlled trials that might have yielded data that could help Democrats in 2024, according to two people familiar with the work, by assessing the impact of things like community newsletters, Facebook ads, and so-called “relational organizing.”

In all, the report suggested that Bankman-Fried might have spent roughly $100 million, but according to Schleifer, “That could be an undercount.”