In the heart of Washington, where political power and private profit often brush shoulders, a series of recent moves by the Trump administration has reignited fierce debate over the boundaries between public service and personal gain. At the center of this swirl are high-profile names from the worlds of cryptocurrency, drone technology, and global finance—each linked, directly or indirectly, to the Trump family and its close allies.
Just this past month, the cryptocurrency giant Binance made headlines by hiring Ches McDowell, a North Carolina lobbyist with deep ties to Donald Trump Jr., to advocate on its behalf at the White House and Treasury Department. According to Politico, McDowell, a longtime hunting partner of Trump Jr., was brought on board to push for financial policy changes and “administrative relief” for Binance—a company still rebuilding its reputation after years of legal battles. In a testament to the high stakes, Binance paid McDowell’s firm, Checkmate Government Relations, a staggering $450,000 for just one month’s work. That’s not chump change, even in a city where influence often comes with a hefty price tag.
Checkmate, though a relative newcomer in the lobbying game, has already become one of the capital’s most lucrative firms, raking in over $7.1 million in revenue in the three months leading up to late October 2025. This rapid rise is no accident. As Coin Edition reported, Binance’s new lobbying push is part of a larger effort to restore its reputation and reestablish relationships in Washington after a bruising period of regulatory scrutiny. In 2024, the company agreed to a $4 billion settlement with U.S. regulators, which saw its founder Changpeng Zhao (CZ) step down as CEO, pay a $50 million fine, and serve a short stint in prison for anti-money laundering violations.
But fortunes can change quickly in Washington. Last week, President Donald Trump granted a pardon to Zhao, described by Politico as a “remarkable turn of fortune” for the crypto billionaire. The timing was striking: Binance’s intensified lobbying campaign, its hiring of McDowell, and a renewed wave of optimism among the company’s leadership all followed closely on the heels of the pardon. “The future is bright,” said Binance’s new CEO, Richard Teng, expressing confidence in the company’s prospects under Trump’s administration.
Binance hasn’t stopped at lobbying alone. In February 2025, the company and Zhao hired Teresa Goody Guillén, a prominent crypto attorney who was once considered for SEC Chair under Trump. Her firm has since received $290,000 in legal fees from Binance and Zhao, further cementing the company’s connections to Trump’s inner circle. And the numbers tell the story: by October 26, 2025, Binance had already reported $860,000 in lobbying expenses for the year, signaling a full-throttle effort to influence U.S. policy under the new administration.
Yet the Binance saga is just one chapter in a much broader narrative of blurred lines between government and private interests. As reported by the Tehran Times, the U.S. War Department recently purchased 3,500 drone motors and related parts from Unusual Machines, a company in which Donald Trump Jr. holds a roughly $4 million stake and serves as an adviser. The Army has indicated that a follow-on order for 20,000 parts next year is possible, underscoring the company’s meteoric rise since Trump Jr. joined its ranks. Shares of Unusual Machines soared after his involvement became public, and the company even showcased its products at a Mar-a-Lago demonstration—an event that raised more than a few eyebrows among ethics watchdogs.
“The proximity of family investments to procurement decisions creates an unavoidable perception of impropriety,” noted several ethics experts cited by the Tehran Times. For critics, the drone deal is emblematic of a larger pattern: a White House increasingly comfortable with turning policy into personal profit, and a president whose campaign promise to “drain the swamp” appears, to some, to have morphed into a system where rules bend under the weight of family fortunes.
The pattern extends far beyond drones and digital coins. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s $40 billion stabilization package for Argentina, for example, drew sharp criticism from Trump’s own political base. The deal, which exchanged U.S. dollars for Argentine pesos, offered little benefit to ordinary Americans but delivered sizable gains to billionaire hedge fund manager Rob Citrone—a longtime friend of Bessent and former associate at Soros Fund Management. According to the Tehran Times, CPAC-affiliated operatives helped coordinate meetings between Argentine officials, Citrone, and U.S. policymakers, highlighting a nexus of political influence and private profit that’s hard to ignore.
Perhaps most striking is the convergence of regulatory rollbacks and private enrichment in the cryptocurrency arena. The Trump family’s World Liberty Financial (WLF) stablecoin, USD1, emerged alongside a $2 billion Emirati investment and a U.S.-facilitated deal for AI chip sales to Emirati firms tied to Sheikh Tahnoon. These deals, reportedly brokered by Trump envoys and close family allies, preceded favorable policy shifts and, ultimately, Zhao’s high-profile pardon. As the Tehran Times put it, “market access, political access, and policy relief” seem to move in lockstep, benefiting private interests at the highest levels.
Diplomacy, too, is increasingly intertwined with business. This summer, Trump’s Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff met Sheikh Tahnoon aboard a super yacht off Sardinia, a setting as opulent as it is symbolic of global elite networking. Not long after, the White House relaxed restrictions on exporting advanced AI chips to Emirati firms tied to Sheikh Tahnoon’s G42. Family advisers, G42 executives, and White House tech aides reportedly operated in overlapping roles throughout the negotiations, creating a web of commercial and diplomatic interests that would test even the most robust ethics rules.
Key insiders, like David Sacks—the administration’s AI-and-crypto czar—received ethics waivers to participate in chip talks despite prior financial ties to Persian Gulf investors. According to the New York Times, internal dissent within the White House was overridden after the dismissal of a key national-security official, sidelining those who pushed for tighter safeguards. For many observers, these episodes paint a picture of a Washington where governance, national security procurement, and international finance are increasingly threaded through personal relationships and private gain.
All these developments raise uncomfortable questions about the state of American governance. Is the public interest being served, or are private fortunes dictating policy? For a president who once vowed to clean up Washington, the current landscape looks more like a system where the lines between public duty and personal enrichment have never been blurrier.
As the dust settles on these headline-grabbing deals, one thing is clear: the intersection of politics, business, and family loyalty in Trump’s Washington will remain a source of fascination—and controversy—for months, if not years, to come.
