Trump’s ‘illegal’ meme coin dinner contest nets insiders $900K in 48 hours

President Donald Trump and his team pulled in nearly $900,000 in trading fees over just two days through the $TRUMP crypto token, according to Chainalysis.

The cash came flooding in after an announcement on Wednesday that the top 220 holders of $TRUMP would win a black-tie optional dinner with him on May 22 at his private club near Washington, D.C.

The event promises a special reception for the top 25 token holders, and the website also promotes a “VIP White House Tour” the following day. An active leaderboard tracks the usernames of buyers scrambling to get a seat.

The $TRUMP coin, already a meme-heavy asset, saw its price rocket up more than 50% after the dinner contest announcement, pushing its total market value to $2.7 billion. The president’s political rivals slammed the move immediately.

Senator Chris Murphy, a Democrat from Connecticut, posted on X that the sale was “the most brazenly corrupt thing a President has ever done. Not close.”

Trump’s circle controls token profits while critics demand probe

The Trump Organization and its affiliates currently control about 80% of the $TRUMP token supply, based on information from the project’s website. Since the launch of the token in January, about $324.5 million in trading fees have been collected.

Every time a trade happens, a slice of the transaction is sent directly to wallets managed by the people behind the token, according to the same website. Chainalysis confirmed that this setup keeps money flowing into wallets connected to the project’s creators.

The majority of tokens are locked in a three-year vesting plan, meaning they’ll be released gradually to avoid a sudden dump on the market — a trick in crypto circles called a “rug pull.” Lockups like this are supposed to build trust by making sure insiders can’t immediately cash out and wreck the token’s price.

Even with the lockup, the dinner contest raised alarms. Senators Adam Schiff from California and Elizabeth Warren from Massachusetts called on the U.S. Office of Government Ethics to investigate whether offering dinner with Trump for buying tokens breaks anti-corruption rules. They warned that the event smells like pay-to-play corruption, blurring the line between political access and financial gain.

Ethics commentators call foul as foreign ties surface among holders

Delaney Marsco, who leads ethics work at the Campaign Legal Center, told NBC News that while the $TRUMP contest is a clear breach of traditional ethics, it probably won’t be ruled illegal.

“Criminal conflicts of interest statutes don’t apply to the president,” Marsco said. She pointed out that modern presidents since Carter have stepped away from business interests to avoid conflicts, but Trump is using loopholes to keep financial ties alive.

“The fact that he is not barred by the law from having these financial interests like this meme coin allows him to engage in a lot of seemingly corrupt activity. It has the appearance of a pay to play, so the president is apparently selling access to himself,” Marsco said.

Molly White, an independent crypto researcher, explained to NBC News that the $TRUMP leaderboard hides real identities by only showing screen names. White warned that it’s impossible to know who exactly is spending on dinner access.

She also said some $TRUMP buyers are tied to foreign crypto exchanges banned in the U.S., including Binance. At least one of the top holders has an active Binance account, despite the platform being closed off to American users.

Schiff and Warren backed their ethics complaint with public reports showing that funds from banned crypto platforms might be tied to $TRUMP investments. They pressed the Office of Government Ethics to dig into how deep the foreign connections go.

Trump’s return to the White House was backed heavily by the crypto industry, which poured tens of millions of dollars into the 2024 election. This cash beat out donations from old industries like banking and oil.

Besides $TRUMP, there’s also a $MELANIA token backed by the first family. They are also tied to World Liberty Financial, a decentralized finance company that raised $550 million since October through two token sales.

Buyers of those tokens are banned from reselling and don’t share in profits. Instead, a Trump-linked company claims 75% of the net revenue, including proceeds from token sales.

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