Two weeks ago I attended the Democratic National Convention. The chief reason I did so was to try and encourage an impartiality to our coverage of politics as it relates to the election and Bitcoin here at Bitcoin Magazine. Earlier this year we were invited the the Republican National Convention at the last minute, after David Bailey’s coordination with the Trump campaign began preceding his speaking at the Bitcoin 2024 conference in Nashville in July.
It bothered me to see people associated with this company taking such a one-sided stand with the Republican Party, despite the reality that in fact many more Republican politicians support Bitcoin compared to Democrats. The Republican Party even formally integrated Bitcoin into their public policy platform at the convention. The Democrats have not.
That is not to say that no Democrats support Bitcoin. At the national level Representative Ro Khanna from California, Ritchie Torres from New York, and Senator Kirsten Gillibrand also from New York have been vocal supporters of Bitcoin in Congress. These politicians exist, they are vocal, but they do not seem to have the same resonance with the rest of the party or their voting base that exists in the Republican Party.
During the first day that I attended, Bitcoin was not mentioned a single time. It wasn’t a very prominent topic at the RNC, but it was mentioned. It was included in the party policy platform. No such inclusion took place at the DNC. The focus of the first day was on the coming election, Kamala versus Trump.
I do have to say that not much of the discussion centered around policy. It was mostly rhetorical, and focused on general issues concerning Democratic voters, interspersed with the type of rah-rah language one would expect at an event focused on candidate selection for the Democrat party this election cycle.
While no policies explicitly were touched on, many of the issues that Democrats find important were. Minority inclusion, women’s rights, well paying jobs and union security, healthcare (especially as it relates to Covid which is still circulating even though people don’t place the same focus on it), and the perceived attempt by Republicans to roll back progress from the point of view of Democrats on many of these issues.
A number of union leaders spoke either in person or with recorded messages during the convention’s first day, the Arizona Pipefitters and Pumbers Union, the Communications Workers of America Union (CWA), International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW), the American Federation of State, County, and Munipical Employees (AFSCME). All of them had much to say on the topic of lost jobs during Covid, and the recovery of jobs that took place under the Biden Administration. Another big issue was union pension funds. Union jobs are generally sought, and coveted, due to the benefits and retirement security that comes along with them, not simply the good base pay.
Is anything standing out to you? Maybe the fact that Bitcoin actually can synergize and help advance these goals that Democrats seem to care about?
Bitcoin can absolutely help minorities suffering economically, at least over long time horizons. Ignoring the aberration of this current market cycle, people holding bitcoin over long time periods have absolutely benefited from increased purchasing power. While obviously it takes money to make money, and people starting with less will realize less in terms of appreciation, anyone with money to save has historically in the long term wound up with more purchasing power. This won’t help people in poverty as much as those with a large surplus of money to invest, but it will help.
Bitcoin can also assist women in maintaining access to healthcare that is increasingly being banned in parts of the US. Financial institutions have increasingly been censoring financial transactions deemed troublesome culturally, despite their legal status. There is no reason to assume that this activity will continue only affecting people on the right side of the political spectrum. Bitcoin is an alternative to traditional financial institutions. And I shouldn’t need to tell people that it can function even for services that are outright deemed illegal.
Pension funds for workers have also recently started taking conservative exposure to bitcoin, which again looking at historical long term performance can be a huge benefit to solvency issues in the long term facing pensions all over the country.
Bitcoin can even be a massive boon to renewable energy, something liberals care very deeply about as it relates to mitigating the consequences of global climate change and maintaining our natural environment. Bitcoin miners are in a very unique position, with AI operators only recently starting to fill a similar niche, to be buyers of stranded renewable energy before it becomes connected to the grid. This allows revenue the instant these projects are finished, rather than having to wait to be connected to retail energy consumers on the grid.
That is to say nothing about the general open access nature of Bitcoin, and how it can advance the philosophy of freedom and inclusion globally by providing people with an option in the face of fighting and resisting totalitarian regimes worldwide. Bitcoin is a natural fit for many of the proclaimed beliefs and principles of Democrats.
So why is there no attention from the Party at large? Why is there no mention or inclusion in their policy platform similar to Republicans?
It’s the base. The recent American Bitcoin Survey by the Nakamoto Project showed us that bitcoin ownership is a bipartisan thing, that it is not concentrated on the right as is generally perceived in the public. So why does that perception continue to exist? Narratives. Stories. Messaging. The reason the Democratic Party does not care as widely about Bitcoin as a policy issue isn’t because Democrats and liberals don’t use it or hold it, it is because of the wider narratives. The perception is that Bitcoin is a rightwing thing. The associations made between Bitcoin and important issues come across as rightwing.
Democratic politicians at large are not going to care about Bitcoin in terms of policy, and cater to Bitcoiners with positive policy, unless those narratives and associations change. This is the reality of politics, politicians cater to their voters. They do not generally take forward thinking initiatives on their own unless they see some benefit in terms of positive voter reaction and perception towards that initiative. This is politics.
Shouting at politicians won’t change that, demonizing them for apathetic or negative reactionary responses to the perception of it being rightwing in a polarized political climate won’t change that. You need to reach the voting base. That is the only thing that will cause a change in attitude and action on the part of Democratic politicians. People who are on the left need to be shown that Bitcoin is something that aligns with and can advance their political goals and agendas, the same way that wider perception has been propagated on the right.
It will definitely be an uphill battle given the baggage of past and existing perception, but this is the only way that the increasingly cemented perception of Bitcoin being a rightwing thing can be pushed back against. Without concerted effort to demonstrate and build narratives showing left leaning people that Bitcoin can, and does, align with their values, Bitcoin is doomed to be forced into a left/right partisan paradigm.