{"id":128160,"date":"2025-04-29T03:18:26","date_gmt":"2025-04-29T03:18:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cryptospotters.net\/?p=128160"},"modified":"2025-04-29T03:18:26","modified_gmt":"2025-04-29T03:18:26","slug":"crypto-group-asks-trump-to-end-prosecution-of-crypto-devs-roman-storm","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/cryptospotters.net\/?p=128160","title":{"rendered":"Crypto group asks Trump to end prosecution of crypto devs, Roman Storm"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Source: Cointelegraph.com NewsThe crypto lobby group, the DeFi Education Fund, has petitioned the Trump administration to end what it claimed was the \u201clawless prosecution\u201d of open-source software developers, including Roman Storm, a creator of the crypto mixing service Tornado Cash.<br \/>\nIn an April 28 letter to White House crypto czar David Sacks, the group urged President Donald Trump \u201cto take immediate action to discontinue the Biden-era Department of Justice&#8217;s lawless campaign to criminalize open-source software development.\u201d\u00a0<br \/>\nThe letter specifically mentioned the prosecution of Storm, who was charged in August 2023 with helping launder over $1 billion in crypto through Tornado Cash. His trial is still set for July, and his fellow charged co-founder, Roman Semenov, is at large and believed to be in Russia.<br \/>\nThe DeFi Education Fund said that in Storm\u2019s case, the Department of Justice is attempting to hold software developers criminally liable for how others use their code, which is \u201cnot only absurd in principle, but it sets a precedent that potentially chills all crypto development in the United States.\u201d<br \/>\nThe group also called for the recognition that the prosecution contradicts the Treasury Department\u2019s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) guidance from Trump\u2019s first term, which established that developers of self-custodial, peer-to-peer protocols are not money transmitters.\u00a0<br \/>\nSource: DeFi Education Fund\u201cThis kind of legal environment does not just chill innovation \u2014 it freezes it,\u201d they argued. The letter added that it also \u201cempowers politically-motivated enforcement and puts every open-source developer at risk, regardless of industry.\u201d<br \/>\nIn January, a federal court in Texas ruled that the Treasury overstepped its authority by sanctioning Tornado Cash.\u00a0<br \/>\nStakes could not be higher<br \/>\nThe group thanked Trump for his support of the industry and his stated goal to make America the \u201ccrypto capital of the planet.\u201d\u00a0<br \/>\nThey added, however, that his goal can\u2019t be realized if developers are prosecuted for building tools that enable the technology.<br \/>\n\u201cWe ask President Trump to protect American software developers, restore legal clarity, and end this unlawful DOJ overreach. The job\u2019s not finished, and the stakes could not be higher.\u201d<br \/>\nRelated: Tornado Cash dev wants charges dropped after court said OFAC \u2018overstepped\u2019<br \/>\nVariant Fund chief legal officer Jake Chervinsky said the Justice Department\u2019s case against Storm is \u201can outdated remnant of the Biden administration&#8217;s war on crypto.\u201d\u00a0<br \/>\n\u201cThere is no justification in law or policy for prosecuting software developers for launching non-custodial smart contract protocols,\u201d he added.\u00a0<br \/>\nAt the time of writing, the petition had attracted 232 signatures from industry executives and developers, including Coinbase co-founder Fred Ehrsam, Paradigm co-founder Matt Huang, and Ethereum core developer Tim Beiko, among others.<br \/>\nMagazine: Bitcoin $100K hopes on ice, SBF\u2019s mysterious prison move: Hodler\u2019s Digest<a href=\"https:\/\/cointelegraph.com\/news\/crypto-group-trump-end-prosecution-crypto-devs-roman-storm?utm_source=rss_feed&amp;utm_medium=rss&amp;utm_campaign=rss_partner_inbound\" target=\"_blank\" class=\"feedzy-rss-link-icon\" rel=\"noopener\">Read More<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Source: Cointelegraph.com NewsThe crypto lobby group, the DeFi Education Fund, has petitioned the Trump administration to end what it claimed was the \u201clawless prosecution\u201d of open-source software developers, including Roman&hellip; <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/cryptospotters.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128160"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/cryptospotters.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/cryptospotters.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/cryptospotters.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=128160"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/cryptospotters.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128160\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/cryptospotters.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=128160"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/cryptospotters.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=128160"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/cryptospotters.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=128160"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}