Disbanding Crypto Cops While Bagholding: Trump Names Todd Blanche Interim AG Despite Ethics Questions

President Donald Trump has appointed Todd Blanche as interim Attorney General after removing Pam Bondi from the role. Blanche, who previously represented Trump in his New York criminal case and was later named deputy attorney general, wasted no time making waves in the crypto space. Apparently, the man who defended Trump against criminal charges decided the next logical step was to defend crypto degens against regulatory overreach—or at least from the people who'd been investigating them.

As deputy attorney general, Blanche disbanded the DOJ's National Cryptocurrency Enforcement Team—which was only formed in 2022 under President Joe Biden—and signed a memo directing prosecutors to avoid pursuing regulatory violation cases against crypto industry players. The NCTE lasted roughly as long as a Solana DeFi yield farm before the devs rug pulled. In just a few short years, the federal crypto cops went from "we're coming for you" to "oops, we disbanded ourselves."

That memo proved consequential. It was cited in the Southern District of New York's case against Tornado Cash developer Roman Storm, leading prosecutors there to drop a charge. Storm was later convicted on another charge and faces a retrial on two more counts later this year. So basically, one memo from a guy who might have been bagholding managed to complicate someone's legal situation. The crypto legal system works in mysterious ways.

Here's where things get interesting. According to his July 10, 2025 government ethics disclosure, Blanche transferred his crypto holdings—including Bitcoin, Solana, ADA, and Ethereum—to his children and a grandchild. His form also noted prior holdings of Polygon, DOT, Quant, and Coinbase stock. That's a solid portfolio, actually. If you're going to be the Attorney General during crypto's regulatory pivot, you might as well have already done your taxes on all of it.

However, ProPublica reported that Blanche still held between $159,000 and $485,000 in various cryptocurrencies when he signed the crypto enforcement memo—potentially violating ethics rules and his own pledge to divest before working on crypto-related matters. Imagine being the guy who writes the memo that could move markets, while holding the bags. That's not insider trading, that's just... having skin in the game. Very on-brand for crypto.