The HODLpac Endorsement Committee
The HODLpac Endorsement Committee
Plus our new website with HODLscore is live!
Today is March 24, 2022. That means we’re 229 days away from the most important United States general election in the short lifespan of public blockchains and cryptocurrency technology.
The scene is set:
President Biden’s Executive Order is currently live and 24 government agencies have been directed to coordinate their approach to regulating digital assets.
The pace of hearings on Capitol Hill and new legislation related to crypto (like last week’s Senate Banking hearing and Elizabeth Warren’s shameful bill) continues to accelerate.
Every major news story these days seems to have a crypto angle, from geopolitics and the war in Ukraine to inflation to big tech.
Indeed, we’re seeing candidates in major races across the country including Bitcoin and crypto policies in their campaign platforms. (Keep scrolling to see how we’re keeping track.)
It’s time for the crypto community in the United States to seize this opportunity and establish ourselves as a formidable political bloc.
HODLpac’s goal is to help the crypto community do just that. Our mission is to build a movement to support candidates for Congress - with our votes and our wallets - that want to see public blockchain technology and the cryptoeconomy thrive in the United States.
That’s why we’re excited to announce a few things towards making that vision a reality.
HODLpac’s Endorsement Committee for 2022
HODLpac is a community-governed PAC. Currently, our members earn governance tokens for donating to HODLpac and participating in Donation Rounds (click here for more info and a sneak preview of next week’s exciting announcement); eventually, we’re going to roll out other ways to earn HODLpac governance tokens. These tokens will be used to steer various aspects of HODLpac.
One of the most impactful decisions HODLpac needs to make as an organization is which candidates to endorse. When a candidate is endorsed, HODLpac funds are able to flow to those candidates during Donation Rounds according to a quadratic funding matching algorithm (if you haven’t clicked yet…)
However, a major lesson from DAO governance experimentation over the last few years is that “governance minimization” is a worthwhile goal. It would simply be too cumbersome and inefficient for the entirety of HODLpac’s membership to vote on whether or not to endorse each candidate.
Enter the HODLpac Endorsement Committee…
The HODLpac Endorsement Committee is a curated group of seven people from across the cryptocurrency ecosystem that are hands-on in policy advocacy and motivated to make the crypto community a political force in 2022 and beyond.
Their role is to make initial endorsement decisions, based on their experience and expertise, to help minimize the governance load of the HODLpac community when it comes to deciding who passes the bar to receive HODLpac funds.
Three important notes worth reading as the drumroll gets louder in your head:
The HODLpac Endorsement Committee is not making donation decisions. They are endorsing candidates such that those candidates can receive funds, but whether or not they actually do receive donations from HODLpac (and how much) will be dependent on the donation decisions of individuals during Donation Rounds (the beauty of quadratic funding).
The Endorsement Committee’s decisions are a first pass at endorsements. HODLpac governance token holders will be able to reverse or compel an endorsement decision via community governance.
The HODLpac Endorsement Committee for the 2022 cycle was selected by HODLpac leadership; but, in subsequent cycles, the Endorsement Committee will be elected by HODLpac governance token holders.
Now, without further ado, HODLpac’s Endorsement Committee for the 2022 election cycle:
Kristin Smith, executive director of the Blockchain Association
Ryan Selkis, CEO of Messari and founder of the Digital Freedom Alliance
David Zell, head of policy at BTC Inc and founder of the Bitcoin Policy Institute
Dennis Porter, Bitcoin-focused public policy advocate and podcast host
John McCarthy, general counsel at Wicklow Capital
Julian Fletcher-Taylor, HODLpac
Tyler Whirty, HODLpac
These seven folks will use HODLscore data and their knowledge from being “boots on the ground” in politics to make initial endorsement decisions and help the crypto community get the context they need to make strategic and effective donation decisions in the 2022 midterms.
On Tuesday of next week, check your inboxes and HODLpac’s Twitter for our first round of endorsements.
HODLscore is Live!
We have a new website and HODLscore v.1 is live.
Check it out:
HODLscore is a candidate scorecard that American crypto-users, -builders, -investors, and -voters can reference to keep tabs on where candidates and incumbents stand on crypto-related policy.
HODLscore has profiles on every candidate and incumbent in the country and we’re reaching out to all of them (except for Brad Sherman) to start a conversation about their stances on the issues that matter to us.
Current features:
A complete list of candidates in 2022 and incumbents in the 117th Congress.
A first attempt at scoring candidates and incumbents on a 0-5 star scale.
Election pages for all of the upcoming primaries.
Legislative data, committee and caucus memberships, and Wikipedia bios.
Initial HODLpac Candidate Questionnaire responses
And more!
This is just the beginning of HODLscore so if this project sounds interesting to you, reply here or join our Discord and we’ll onboard you to the team focused on making it the best candidate tracker in politics.
🐦 Tweets
📚 Good Reads
“Bitcoin and U.S. National Security,” Matthew Pines, Bitcoin Policy Institute
“A Turning Point for Web3 and, Perhaps, Democracy,” Tomicah Tilleman, Medium
“National Security at Stake With Biden's Crypto Executive Order,” Adam Zarazinski, CoinDesk
“New crypto sanctions bill targets publishing code, facilitating transactions,” Jerry Brito and Peter Van Valkenburgh, Coin Center
“Elizabeth Warren’s anti-crypto crusade splits the left,” Zachary Warmbrodt, Politico
“A liberal case for cryptocurrency,” Rep. Ritchie Torres, NY Daily News
“Senate Democrats Call for Emergency Act to Target Crypto and Sanctions,” Nick Anthony, Cato Institute
"The Cryptocurrency World Divide: Government Regulation of Initial Coin Offerings,” Sarah Milby, Blockchain Association
“How Cryptocurrency Is Helping Ukraine,” Illia Polosukhin, WSJ Opinion
🎙️ Listen/Watch
“Inflation, CBDCs, and setting a pro-crypto agenda with Blake Masters,” Nic Carter, Castle Island Podcast
“MMT, CBDCs, and crypto policy in 2022 with Tom Emmer,” Nic Carter, Castle Island Podcast
“Congressman Byron Donalds Interview - The SEC Crypto Reporting Requirements & US Crypto Regulations,” Thinking Crypto Podcast
“A Progressive View of Bitcoin with Margot Paez,” Peter McCormack, What Bitcoin Did Podcast
What’d we miss? Join our Discord and help curate this newsletter!
Disclaimer: HODLpac is FEC-registered hybrid political action committee and is not legally affiliated with any party, party committee, candidate or candidate committee.