'Politically awkward dynamic' pits White House official against Trump's own interests

A 37-year-old White House aide with no congressional experience has been handed the politically fraught task of negotiating a cryptocurrency bill that could crack down on President Donald Trump's vast holdings.

Patrick Witt, executive director of the president's Council of Advisors for Digital Assets, is the administration's point man on the Clarity Act, sweeping legislation meant to overhaul federal crypto oversight that has stalled over restrictions barring federal officials – including Trump – from sponsoring, endorsing or profiting off digital assets, reported Politico.

"The politically awkward dynamic has made Witt a key player in determining the outcome of one of the Trump administration’s top remaining legislative priorities this year," Politico reported. "Supporters say [federal oversight] is necessary to deliver the industry so-called regulatory clarity, [but] some senators are openly questioning whether Witt, who has no previous Capitol Hill experience, is in a position to cut an agreement."

Democrats say it's needed precisely because of the Trump family's crypto ventures, which include a presidential memecoin and World Liberty Financial, a token project Trump and his sons helped launch, but there are doubts on Capitol Hill about the 37-year-old former Yale quarterback's credentials.

“I don’t think he has any authority to make a deal,” said Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA), who sits on the Banking panel but has not been directly involved in the ethics talks. “I think the only person who can make that deal is President Trump.”

Witt answers to the same administration whose financial interests the rules he's negotiating would directly limit, and Sen. Adam Schiff (D-CA) warned that even a finished agreement could be scrapped by the White House at will, leaving the talks vulnerable to being undercut from above at any moment.

Yet lawmakers in both parties say Witt has kept the process from collapsing. Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-WY), who is leading the GOP side of the ethics talks, said Witt has served as one of the only effective channels between two camps that rarely speak to each other directly, briefing senior White House staff on exactly how far the negotiations can bend. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) called him constructive and genuinely invested in getting to a result.

The White House, for its part, rejects any notion that the arrangement is compromised. Press secretary Karoline Leavitt has insisted the president and his family have never engaged in — and never will engage in — conflicts of interest tied to crypto, even as the bill being negotiated exists largely because lawmakers don't believe that.

Witt has also brokered a separate truce between banks and crypto firms with Sens. Thom Tillis (R-NC) and Angela Alsobrooks (D-MD), though Wall Street lobbyists say it falls short. Talks continue as Republicans race to get the bill to the floor before August recess, with a fresh fight over state attorneys general's enforcement power now threatening to blow up the deal.

Conservative influencer Cam Higby set out to embarrass a Democratic congressman's aide over his private life. Instead he handed Rep. Dan Goldman an opening, and the New York Democrat used it to deliver a public dressing-down that left Higby, not the staffer, looking like the story.

Higby, a right-wing content creator who runs the outlet Fearless Media and was credentialed into the Pentagon press corps after most traditional outlets gave up their passes, posted about Goldman's deputy chief of staff, John Blasco. He flagged that Blasco "makes 6 figures, funded by your tax dollars," tied him to an allegation that he "used physical force to stifle press at Delaney Hall while wearing the House seal," and attached personal photographs that appeared to show Blasco, who is openly gay, in nightlife attire. The clear aim was to humiliate.

Goldman, the former lead counsel in Trump's first impeachment, was not having it. "I don't know who you are, @camhigby, but this is a shockingly pathetic and stupid tweet," he wrote. Then came the line that turned the attack around. "I'm sorry you don't feel comfortable in your own skin, but you just told on yourself."

The congressman defended his aide in unsparing terms. "John is an incredible person and public servant who has served New York City with dedication, compassion and grace, qualities you apparently do not have," Goldman wrote. He drew a sharp line around his staff while inviting Higby to aim at him instead. "I'm the member of Congress. You can come for me but stay away from my staff. I will stand with John today, tomorrow, and every day." He signed off with two words: "Do better."

The replies quickly amplified Goldman's framing rather than Higby's. The thrust of the backlash was that posting a man's private photos as a supposed scandal revealed more about the poster's hangups than about the target, exactly the "you told on yourself" point Goldman had made.

Ex-GOP lawmaker Adam Kinzinger also weighed in, simply stating, "But you support an Epstein dude."

Blasco is no anonymous functionary. He has been a visible part of Goldman's office during its high-profile immigration oversight work, accompanying the congressman on visits to detention facilities and helping coordinate assistance for detained families. In one account of that work, Goldman's office described bringing insulin to a diabetic detainee and intervening for a young man with autism whose family feared he would not get his medication. Blasco describes himself publicly as an "unapologetic Queer Boricua," a Brooklyn cyclist and gamer, the kind of biographical detail Higby's post tried to weaponize and that Goldman flipped into a point of pride.

Higby has built his profile on viral confrontation, from a campus debate tour to posting Signal chat screenshots from Minneapolis that he billed as proof of a conspiracy, material the FBI cited to open an investigation that legal experts said showed no illegal activity. The Blasco post fit the pattern of generating a spectacle, except this time the spectacle rebounded on him.

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If the chaos of this last year and a half week has shown us anything, it’s that every distraction Donald Trump has manufactured to stop people from talking about the Epstein Files has failed spectacularly.

The UFC fiasco kicked off a week that ended with a full surrender to Iran at Versailles, which was glaring enough. But the Reflecting Pool scandal has also been an excellent visual metaphor representing all of Trump’s failures to distract from his entire administration’s involvement in the biggest political cover-up in American history.

From his initial “I have the best pool guy” promise to calling the algae-green swampwater “American Blue” to pieces of the bottom literally peeling off, it’s just the latest example of Trump never once delivering on his promises, and then shifting the blame to anyone else he can when he fails. He’s seriously blaming “vandalism” for all of the issues when he’s the vandal.

Trump also revealed his brand-new Air Force One, a bribe gift from Qatar that he turned into yet another grift on the American taxpayers. His predecessors managed just fine on the current AFO, but, then again, we’re talking about the same guy who had Jeffrey Epstein’s legendary Lolita Express repainted instead of just borrowing a plane from some rich friend of his. The audacity of this is staggering.

Astonishingly, no one from the Harris/Walz campaign pointed out that Trump was flying around inside a crime scene. When I found out about it, I screamed into the abyss of Twitter to beg them to make a “Black Lights Matter” joke or SOMETHING to call attention to Trump’s decades-long friendship with the world’s most notorious dead pedophile and his partner-in-unspeakable-crimes, Ghislaine Maxwell.

I tried my best to warn MAGA as well, but it’s fine, what do I know about politics? It’s not like he’s repeatedly blasted them for wanting him to deliver on his campaign promise to release the full Epstein Files.

Oh, wait. Yes, he did.

And for a moment, it seemed like the biggest MAGA accounts on Twitter were ready to finally start acknowledging what we’ve known all along.

But he somehow fooled them again and again, and you won’t be shocked to learn that those and other paid MAGA shill accounts are back to either calling the Files a “hoax” or saying they’ve been fully released, which we know isn’t true.

Nothing they say or do will get us to stop talking about the Epstein Files. You can count on me to stay on this story until the Trump regime actually complies with the Epstein Files Transparency Act, instead of continuing to violate it every day for the last 210+ days.

The top news story every day should be that JD “Vladimir Futon” Vance led a secret staff meeting in the SITUATION ROOM nearly a year ago to discuss how to better cover up the Epstein Files to protect Trump, rather than seeking justice for any of the victims and survivors. Aside from the egregious misuse of the Situation Room, we know the entire administration is involved.

Of course, that’s kind of tough with so much of the media under Trump’s sway while he continues to bully anyone who dares to tell the truth about him or ask any questions that might force him to think about things he doesn’t want to think about.

We now know that FBI was told that Trump Tower was a “hunting ground” for “recruiters” to find young women for him to have sex with. And thanks to yet more bombshell reporting, we’ve also learned that at least three million more pages of Epstein documents are still being held back by acting AG Todd “Trumpsimp” Blanche, who seems super excited to be the first to go to prison for Trump.

Blanche will once again face questioning by the Senate, and I was fortunate to grab a moment with my Senator, Ron Wyden (D-OR), on Friday after a press conference centered around Juneteenth and Pride.

“Sen. Chutzpah” is the ranking Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee and also sits on the Senate Intelligence Committee, among his many other responsibilities. He promised me last year that he’d never give up on Epstein, and he continues to deliver on that promise, as evidenced by his most recent questioning of Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. He also ripped Bessent over the latest Trump grift that was created to enrich his two older adult sons.

As Wyden and I walked out of the press conference, I quietly asked him about the Situation Room meeting. “Wasn’t that something?” he replied.

“So, what people want to see is accountability,” I said. “Do we have to wait until Democrats get the majority back before that happens?”

“Nope!” Sen. Chutzpah immediately responded. He then told me that more hearings were coming, and specifically mentioned Blanche.

As I said, he’s been good about delivering on his promises, and I have no reason to doubt him now.

The issue we currently face with Epstein is keeping the story at the top of a news cycle that’s already full of Trump’s other failed attempts at distracting from Epstein. From the ballooning ballroom budget to his UFC fiasco to the upcoming “America 250” concert that’s also destined to fail, everything Trump does to distract from the Epstein albatross that he carries on his padded shoulder only draws more attention to it.

All Republicans should be asked about the Epstein Files Situation Room meeting and nothing else. Epstein needs to stick to them just like it’s sticking to Trump, and it’ll be up to all of us to make sure Democrats keep holding them accountable.

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President Donald Trump has taken his destruction to another level as he turns Washington, D.C. into the "grimiest swamp of all time," according to one political expert.

David Rothkopf, global affairs columnist for The Daily Beast, said on a new episode of "The Daily Beast Podcast" with host Joanna Coles that Trump's failed renovation of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool has become the perfect symbol of Trump's presidency. Trump promised to turn the old pool into a beautiful specimen, complete with "American flag blue" waters with absolutely no algae, at a cost of just $2 million.

However, the project didn't go as Trump thought it might. The total cost ended up being around $16 million, and the algae that Trump derided has returned in full force. Some visitors even saw a dead duckling floating in its waters, according to reports.

"It’s such a symbol of his vandalism, his failure, his inability to take responsibility for anything, his turning Washington into the grimiest, slimiest swamp of all time,” he said. “This is a metaphor for Trump.”

Rothkopf also noted that Trump's failure to renovate the Reflecting Pool represents a pattern of behavior where the president fails to live up to his own expectations.

“He didn’t do enough damage as the worst, most tasteless developer in America. Now he’s taken it to another scale with tack,” Rothkopf said.

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