Crypto Traitors
Gaslit Nation
Gaslit Nation
4.8 • 4K Ratings
🗓️ 10 December 2025
⏱️ 54 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
On this extremely cursed episode of Gaslit Nation, we take a break from gas station dictatorships to talk about their emo tech cousin: crypto, the shadow banking system for oligarchs, autocrats, and the Trump family, with Andy Greenberg of Wired, author of Tracers in the Dark: The Global Hunt for the Crime Lords of Cryptocurrency.
Greenberg walks us through how Bitcoin was sold as untraceable "freedom money"–digital cash for the revolution!–and instead became a giant glowing crime map. Dark-web drug empires, massive child sex abuse rings, ransomware gangs, investment scam sweatshops, North Korean weapons programs, autocratic terrorists like Russia and China. Turns out their transnational crypto crime sprees left a trace. Greenberg profiles investigators who followed the blockchain to catch some of the world's worst monsters and advises how to "follow the money" in the digital age. We also discuss Trump's crypto war on the U.S. dollar and how he and his family enrich themselves with the help of crypto criminals.
This week's bonus show, for our Patreon supporters at the Truth-teller ($5/month) level and higher, features Gaslit Nation's book club discussion of Deaf Republic by Ilya Kaminsky and Total Resistance by H Von Dach–and an urgent wake-up call to see the Kremlin's long-game in exporting oligarch-fascism, before it's too late. Just today, it was reported that Russia tried to plant bombs on U.S.-bound flights, following similar reports of planned attacks across Europe.
Join our community of listeners and get bonus shows, Q&A sessions, invites to exclusive events like our Monday political salons at 4pm ET over Zoom, ad free listening, group chats with other listeners, ways to shape the show, and more! Sign up at Patreon.com/Gaslit!
Show Notes:
Tracers in the Dark: The Global Hunt for the Crime Lords of Cryptocurrency by Andy Greenberg https://bookshop.org/p/books/tracers-in-the-dark-the-global-hunt-for-the-crime-lords-of-cryptocurrency-andy-greenberg/b449e45a97a6794b?ean=9780593315613&next=t
Trump pardon of billionaire sparks concerns https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fwcHn1GSZwo
Aaron Rupar: "Wow -- Russia reportedly plotted last year to plant bombs on US-bound flights (gift link)" https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:4llrhdclvdlmmynkwsmg5tdc/post/3m7lbz4g7nc2v
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Last month, President Trump granted a pardon to a billionaire felon after the felon's company enriched a Trump family business. |
| 0:10.6 | The pardon went to Changping Zhao, a Chinese-born businessman who was accused by the Justice Department of causing, quote, significant harm to U.S. national security. |
| 0:22.8 | The president says he does not know Zhao. Our reporting shows that Zhao's company supported a Trump |
| 0:30.0 | family firm at critical moments leading up to the president's pardon. |
| 0:37.0 | Changping Zhao is founder of Binance, |
| 0:40.5 | the world's largest exchange for cryptocurrency, |
| 0:44.5 | or digital money on the internet. |
| 0:47.3 | In 2023, Zhao and his company pled guilty |
| 0:51.6 | to failing to prevent money laundering on Binance. |
| 0:56.0 | Binance paid a $4 billion fine. |
| 0:59.3 | Zhao served a four-month sentence. |
| 1:02.6 | He's one of the richest men in the world, and he was essentially allowing his company to be used |
| 1:08.7 | as a platform to finance criminal activity, to send money |
| 1:12.9 | to terrorist organizations, Al-Qaeda, Hamas, ISIS, and he was prosecuted criminally for that. |
| 1:20.6 | Elizabeth Oyer knows pardons. She was in charge of vetting pardon applications at the Justice |
| 1:27.0 | Department. She's been a critic of |
| 1:29.3 | the Trump administration since she was replaced last spring by a Trump loyalist. Oyer told us, |
| 1:36.7 | Zhao wasn't close to meeting Justice Department guidelines for a pardon. You would describe this |
| 1:44.0 | pardon as unusual? |
| 1:46.1 | The influence that money played in securing this pardon is unprecedented. |
| 1:51.4 | The self-dealing aspect of the pardon in terms of the benefit that it conferred on President |
| 1:56.8 | Trump and his family and people in his inner circle is also unprecedented. |
... |
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