Moreno unseated Democrat Sherrod Brown, who drew the crypto industry’s ire for focusing on crime and scams, as Ohio Senator.
Moreno previously founded a blockchain-related company and was once a member of blockchain policy group The Digital Chamber before pivoting to politics.
Posted December 20, 2024 at 5:06 pm EST.
Newly elected Ohio Republican Senator Bernie Moreno will serve on the Senate Banking Committee, a group that is responsible for overseeing the SEC and plays a key role in developing crypto legislation. Moreno received over $40 million from crypto-focused political action committees (PACs) to defeat incumbent Ohio Democratic Senator and crypto critic Sherrod Brown.
Brown had deeply frustrated the industry by refusing to prioritize crypto legislation as Chair of the Senate Banking Committee, thereby stalling the passage of bills having to do with market structure and stablecoins. Brown had also supported Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren in holding hearings on how terrorist organizations were utilizing crypto and consistently calling on X for regulators to rein in the industry.
“In an ironic twist, the anti-crypto Sen. Brown not only lost his Senate seat to pro-crypto Sen. Moreno, but now his seat on the Senate Banking Committee. Moreno joins a strong lineup of other pro-crypto Senators and brings the unique expertise of having actually ran a blockchain company. His deep knowledge of crypto and operating a business in the US will be a well added addition to the Senate Banking Committee,” said Ron Hammond, Director of Government Relations at The Blockchain Association.
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As a member of the Senate Banking Committee, Moreno will be in a position to weigh in on the details of legislation related to US economic policies, including those relating to crypto market structure, stablecoins, and the potential creation of a national bitcoin reserve. Several members of Congress have pledged to prioritize legislation on these topics next year. However, it is South Carolina Republican Senator Tim Scott, who is also outspokenly pro crypto but didn’t receive the same financial support from the industry as Moreno, who will chair the committee and decide which bills it prioritizes.
Moreno’s Crypto Background
In 2018, Moreno founded the company Ownum, which sells technology to put car titles on the blockchain, and was once a member of blockchain policy group The Digital Chamber before pursuing politics. Though Moreno did not list crypto among his 16 core “policy priorities” on his campaign website, he did post multiple statements of support for the industry on X and spoke out against a harsh regulatory environment on the campaign trail in the months leading up to the election, solidifying a reputation for being a strong crypto advocate.
“Our Founding Fathers would have been bitcoiners,” he told Bitcoin Magazine in June. “They believed in the decentralization of power.”
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Moreno’s support for the industry attracted millions of dollars in campaign support from crypto business leaders and PACs. The Fairshake PAC, for example, gave over $40 million to Moreno’s campaign, which was primarily used to fund ads that did not focus on crypto but instead on Moreno’s investments in small businesses, as well as warning about the threat of immigrants and China.
Moreno’s win has been somewhat controversial post-election due to the fact that unseating Sherrod Brown made the even more anti-crypto Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren the senior member of the now-minority Democratic party on the committee. This means that if Democrats take back the Senate in two years, Warren would be the Chair of the Senate Banking Committee and in a position to block crypto legislation or initiate the markups of bills that could restrict the industry.
