Masters of the Universe
Club for Growth is a conservative-leaning nonprofit that advocates for free-market economics. It has long wielded substantial influence in Republican circles, and makes no bones about that in the blockchain arena.
An official affiliated with the super PAC told The Daily Beast the group is a “bit of a response to GOP establishment crypto PACs” that have recently cropped up.
“It’s an emerging issue, and Club for Growth wants to lead on it,” the official said.
Buy my bags
Crypto Freedom will also support candidates beyond Masters, he added, saying that “the group’s reach will be broader in the future.”
Three weeks after it was created, the super PAC plunked down about $900,000 on its first ad, with nearly $875,000 of that total going to TV airtime. The spot slams Masters’ primary opponent, Arizona businessman Jim Lamon, over his corporate ties to China, with an ominous voiceover and sinophobic graphics that combined cost a whopping $12,500.
Curiously, there’s no mention of crypto. The official explained that the crypto PAC will focus on crypto messaging in the future.
But Crypto Freedom will have to elbow its way through a raft of new pro-crypto super PACs. Those groups have spent tens of millions of dollars on midterm elections—almost all of it from a handful of investors.
Diamond Hands
Club for Growth, of course, also has billionaire backers. The group’s official super PAC, called “Club for Growth Action,” has raked in nearly $50 million ahead of the 2022 midterms. And the nonprofit arm raised $16.3 million in 2020, according to its tax filing from that year.
But Crypto Freedom’s donors will remain cryptic, for a time. The group doesn’t have to file a fundraising report until late July, just before the Arizona primary election.
The group might even be a vehicle for one megadonor. Another Club for Growth super PAC, the similarly-titled “School Freedom Fund,” got its $15 million in funding from Club for Growth financier and bitcoin-backing billionaire Jeff Yass—who has maxed out to the Masters campaign committee.
Bored Ape Yacht Club
A contingent of crypto kingpins have funded the lion’s share of another super PAC behind Masters—the Peter Thiel-backed “Saving Arizona.”
Thiel, Masters’ billionaire mentor and another “Bitcoin maximalist,” ponied up $10 million in seed funding, adding another $3.5 million in recent weeks. The crypto-fevered Winklevoss twins, who have laid claim to co-creating Facebook, contributed $50,000 each—by far their largest donations to date. This month, another bitcoin mogul, Thiel fellow Erik Finman, pledged to match his benefactor’s $10 million. Nearly half of Saving Arizona donors have stakes in cryptocurrency.
And the jury is still out on whether crypto messaging is truly intended to motivate those voters, or just donors looking to throw some weight around in Washington.
HODL
Only 16 percent of Americans say they’ve interacted with virtual currency, according to a Pew Research poll published last November. Weeks after that poll was released, global crypto markets crashed, tripping an ongoing plunge that has erased 70 percent of Bitcoin’s value and left investors deeply rattled.
At the start of his campaign, Masters, 34, used crypto to burnish his image as a fresh-faced outsider. In October, he tweeted that the United States should establish a federal Bitcoin reserve.
It’s unclear how much of Masters’ millions in bitcoin have been wiped out since then. Last month he warned investors to “buckle up” for “exceptionally volatile” days ahead.
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