The US government’s crypto and AI czar, David Sacks, is stepping down from his special government employee (SGE) role to join Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg and Nvidia’s Jensen Huang on Donald Trump’s new tech council.
Sacks announced his departure in an Interview with Bloomberg that also covered the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST).
Sacks told Bloomberg, “In the first year of the Trump administration, I had that role as an SGE. I had 130 days.”
“We’ve now used up that time,” Sacks said, adding that his role as co-chair of PCAST means he’ll now “make recommendations on not just AI, but an expansive range of technology topics.”
Read more: David Sacks promised ‘market structure bill in 100 days’ a year ago
The council has been created to guide tech policies within government, and counts major tech executives such as Marc Andreessen and Sergey Brin among its ranks.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk was also a SGE under Trump’s administration, and also stepped down from the role after 130 days. He won’t be part of the tech council, however.
Sacks’ time as crypto czar was bittersweet
Under Sacks’ stewardship, the US administration loosened its grip on crypto regulations, the president launched a memecoin, and the government promised to implement a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve (SBR).
During this time, it gained a reputation for intense profiteering and crypto corruption. Indeed, Trump’s son Eric boasted very publicly about his family making profits of $1 billion from its various crypto enterprises.
Sacks promised in February last year that the market structures bill, aka the CLARITY Act, and stablecoin legislation, also known as the GENIUS Act, would have been passed through the Senate and House within 100 days.
While the GENIUS Act was passed, albeit well beyond the self-imposed deadline, the CLARITY Act is still struggling to join it.
Sacks was revealed by the New York Times to have held over 400 investments in various crypto and AI firms while still maintaining his SGE role in Trump’s administration, raising concerns about a potential conflict of interest.
The administration also signed into existence the SBR but it was watered down significantly when officials revealed that the US wouldn’t be buying any BTC to contribute to the it and would instead rely on the coins it had already seized and forfeited.
An audit of crypto assets intended for both the SBR and Digital Asset Stockpile was supposed to be complete by April 5, 2025. However, no such review has been published almost 356 days after the deadline.
Read more: David Sacks sends silly legal threat to the New York Times
Crypto traders happy about David Sacks crypto czar departure
Upon discovering Sacks’ departure yesterday, X users have remarked on the less-than-stellar effect he had on the crypto market.
Venture capitalist Adam Cochran mocked Bitcoiners who voted for Trump, asking “How’d that bitcoin reserve work out for you? Remember those day one promises?”
“Remember how Trump and Sacks promised you the world, and you told us we had TDS when we told you that you were getting played?” he added.
Others pointed to today’s BTC price of $66,600, and how it’s down 34% from the day Sacks was inaugurated as crypto czar.
Read more: US Strategic Bitcoin Reserve audit now 172 days overdue
Traders have also complained that under Sacks’ role, nothing was actually achieved, adding that he’s “the single most useless person of Trump administration [sic] (right there with Trump).”
Eleanor Terrett reports that it’s unclear whether or not Sacks’ crypto czar role will be replaced while major crypto legislation, such as the CLARITY Act, continues to work its way through the Senate.
If the Trump administration does decide to hire a replacement, at least one willing candidate has already thrown their hat into the ring on X. Despite currently serving a 25-year prison sentence, FTX fraudster Sam Bankman-Fried posted simply “dibs.”
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