The Senate passed a resolution this week declaring that FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried should not receive a pardon. The unanimous decision comes as Bankman-Fried requested an official presidential pardon earlier this year.
“It should not be considered controversial to say that someone like Sam Bankman-Fried – a fraudster who was convicted by a unanimous jury – should not be allowed to walk away scot-free. That’s exactly what the Senate affirmed when they passed my resolution,” said Senator Ruben Gallego (D-AZ), one of the resolution’s sponsors. “Bankman-Fried stole billions from hardworking Americans. He’s a criminal who deserves to stay locked up.”
The resolution expresses the “sense of the Senate that under no circumstances should Samuel Bankman-Fried receive executive clemency, including a pardon or commutation, and affirming the Senate’s commitment to the rule of law and integrity of the United States financial system,” it says. It adds that clemency “would erase the conviction of Bankman-Fried, weaken deterrence, and send a deeply damaging message that perpetrators of large scale financial fraud can escape permanent accountability.”
The Department of Justice’s website states that Bankman-Fried applied for relief through a “Pardon after Completion of Sentence.” He previously relayed his desire for a pardon in an interview with Fox News.
“I assume that you would want a pardon from the White House?” asked FOX Business correspondent Susan Li, to which Bankman-Fried responded, “Absolutely. It would be obviously, you know, ultimately up to the president, not up to me.”
Bankman-Fried has claimed his prosecution was wrongful. “I didn’t steal user funds either,” he told Li. “Customers have been repaid now 170% or so on their deposits. It’s one of the very few cases where the platform was over-collateralized, where customers were more than made whole. And yet there was, you know, not just a criminal investigation, but a prosecution. And, you know, dozens of years of sentence[s].”
Bankman-Fried “misappropriated billions of dollars of customer funds deposited with FTX, defrauded investors in FTX of more than $1.7 billion, and defrauded lenders to Alameda of more than $1.3 billion,” according to the DOJ. He was previously found guilty on “two counts of wire fraud, two counts of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, one count of conspiracy to commit securities fraud, one count of conspiracy to commit commodities fraud, and one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering.”
