Key Takeaways
Trump felt manipulated after discovering his post was influenced by a lobbyist linked to Ripple Labs.
Ballard Partners, despite the incident, gained 130 new clients with $14 million revenue in Q1 2025.
In March, Trump shocked the crypto community after publicly endorsing XRP, Solana, and Cardano for a proposed US crypto reserve—now a new report suggests that he wasn’t getting the full story.
Politico revealed Thursday that the post, intended to signal Trump’s support for a “Crypto Strategic Reserve,” was orchestrated by an employee of Ballard Partners, a firm with ties to Ripple Labs, the company behind XRP.
The lobbyist, who was attending a donor event at Mar-a-Lago that weekend when the statement was released, reportedly urged Trump to publish a prewritten message without fully disclosing its connection to Ripple.
Trump, who believed he was making a broad statement in support of American crypto innovation, was “furious” and felt manipulated after learning Ripple was a client of Ballard Partners.
In the aftermath, Trump allegedly told aides that Brian Ballard, the firm’s founder and a longtime fundraiser, was “not welcome in anything anymore.”
White House staff were instructed to freeze out Ballard, and some crypto companies have since raised quiet concerns about the appearance of backchannel influence.
Ballard denied any wrongdoing and maintained that neither he nor his team misled the president. He dismissed the accusations, pointing to the firm’s continued success across sectors and saying Ballard Partners continues to deliver “results and effective advocacy” for clients.
Trump signed an order creating a Bitcoin reserve and digital asset stockpile funded by seized crypto
Days after the historic post, President Trump signed an executive order forming a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve and a Digital Asset Stockpile, both to be funded using crypto assets seized through federal criminal and civil asset forfeiture proceedings.
Unlike the Bitcoin reserve, the government does not plan to actively acquire altcoins—only those obtained through forfeiture will be held. The Treasury Department will oversee management of the digital asset stockpile and is authorized to sell assets as needed.
It is unclear whether XRP will be added to the stockpile, as this depends on whether any federal agencies report their holdings to the Treasury Secretary by the recent disclosure deadline. The executive order does not mandate public release of submitted reports.
In March, David Sacks, the White House’s crypto czar, clarified that Trump’s mention of XRP, Solana, and Cardano was based on their status as top-five crypto assets by market capitalization at the time.