US President Donald Trump has defended his co-ownership of World Liberty Financial (WLFI), rejecting questions about potential conflicts of interest tied to his family's crypto businesses. He framed the concerns as something every president before him has had to deal with and argued that his sons should not have to suspend their business activities simply because he holds office.
What Trump Told 60 Minutes
In an interview with 60 Minutes at the White House over the weekend, Trump was asked about his co-ownership of World Liberty, which is managed by his sons and counts foreign investors connected to the UAE among its backers.
Interviewer Ross Douthat suggested that the Emirati investors could be seeking influence through their involvement in the company and asked the president why that would look different had the positions been reversed and it was the Biden family business with Middle Eastern backers.
"You would say that sounds corrupt, right?" Douthat asked, and Trump responded that his not knowing how WLFI is run was the difference.
Pressed on why he does not simply divest from companies in which people in foreign countries are invested so as not to raise accusations of corruption, Trump pointed out that most of his money sits with large Wall Street firms in index funds, with his children running the family business, and that he had little knowledge of what was being traded.
"My sons run the company. It's hard to say to them, 'Don't do anything anymore for four years because I'm president,'" he explained.
Senate Probe Adds to Scrutiny
It isn't the first time Trump has had to defend his crypto ventures. Similar questions were raised in July in a CNBC interview, where the president said he "could know about it," but there was "nothing illegal" or wrong with that.
He made more than $1.2 billion from his crypto businesses last year, including nearly $600 million from WLFI and $636 million from the sale of meme coins tied to his name, according to the report. When Douthat pointed out that no earlier president had owned a crypto company, Trump replied that his predecessors owned "whatever crypto was at the time," including oil, suggesting that cryptocurrencies are merely this era's version of whatever big assets heads of state have always held.
"Every president has had this problem," Trump insisted.
The interview came as scrutiny of the first family's crypto interests intensified after Senator Richard Blumenthal sent letters to World Liberty and Fight Fight Fight LLC, a key entity behind the Trump meme coin, as well as Binance and USDT issuer Tether, demanding they hand over records requested by the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations by January 4, 2027.
The inquiry into WLFI and Fight Fight Fight reportedly concerns possible conflicts of interest in the Trump family's digital asset operations, although no final conclusion has been made.
