On Sunday, the disgraced former crypto exchange company FTX issued a press release demanding that all who received political donations from the company return those donations.
According to Axios, former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried was the second-largest political donor to Democrats in the 2022 midterm election cycle, giving approximately $37 million in total. FTX debtors are now reaching out to “political figures, political action funds and other recipients of contributions or other payments” to request full refunds.
FTX, which collapsed and went bankrupt almost overnight last November, is demanding that all donations be returned by February 28th. The company had previously asked donation recipients back in December to return the funds voluntarily.
If anyone does not return the payments, FTX debtors have claimed that they “reserve the right to commence actions before the Bankruptcy Court to require the return of such payments, with interest accruing from the date any action is commenced.” They also warned that if any recipients were revealed to have made a “payment or donation to a third party (including a charity)” equal to the amount donated to them by FTX, the company still retains the right to ask for the same amount of money back.
Bankman-Fried is currently facing federal charges of fraud, violations of campaign finance law, and money laundering; in a New York federal court last month, he pleaded not guilty.