'He Was Going to Be the First Crypto President': US Veteran Says He Lost $70K After Buying Trump Coins

US Senator from Connecticut Richard Blumenthal recently launched a scathing attack on President Donald Trump and his cryptocurrency schemes.

At a recent forum on crypto in the Trump Administration, Blumenthal had said Trump's priority during the days before he assumed office for the second time was 'cashing in' by launching what he had called the official $TRUMP meme coin.

The senator accused Trump of exploiting the gaps in current crypto laws, while highlighting how the Trump coin was 'effectively a pump-and-dump scheme' that resulted in massive losses for regular investors who believed in a token that inherently had no value but only 'Trump's face and identity' tied to it.

'He was using it to inflate the price of the coin, and then intending that it be dumped,' Blumenthal noted. 'He repeatedly hawked it and hyped it on social media.'

Veteran Loses $70K Trusting Trump Meme Coins

The senator then disclosed his team had talked with at least three investors who bought into Trump-linked meme coins, believing they were a worthwhile investment because they had the endorsement of the US President. However, investors had soon lost everything they had invested.

Blumenthal even played a recording of a US veteran who couldn't believe it was possible to lose money to an investment hyped by the president.

'He was going to be the first crypto president, and that was something I wanted to support. When he announced on Twitter that he released his own crypto project, I wanted to be a part of it. So, I bought some,' the veteran said.

When Trump pitched the Melania meme coin in the following days, the veteran said he bought that as well. 'I trusted Trump that both of these were legitimate projects. However, the reality was that they were scams,' the veteran added.

In a few days, the veteran had lost $10,000 on the $TRUMP coin and $60,000 on the $MELANIA coin. 'I couldn't believe it. I can't believe something like this would happen' the veteran concluded.

Trump's Crypto Schemes Led to $3.8 Billion in Investor Losses

Blumenthal said Trump's crypto schemes had victims, and the consequences were lost retirement accounts, sacrificed savings, and houses in foreclosure.

He even claimed that total investor losses related to Trump's memecoin-related trades were around $3.8 billion, adding that Trump had netted $636 million from the meme coins alone.

From all his crypto ventures, Trump had made profits to the tune of $1.4 billion, according to the senator, who believes these figures did not happen by accident but due to Trump's self-enrichment policies.

'He's sold out the American people. He has enriched his family, his sons, his insider friends, and his campaign donors,' Blumenthal said before disclosing another explosive detail about Trump's crypto income flows.

The senator said that days before Trump's second inauguration, a UAE company paid $500 million for a 49% stake in his other firm, World Liberty Financial. Soon after, another UAE firm, all of them linked to the ruling family and a major wealth fund, purchased $2 billion of its so-called stablecoin.

In all, Blumenthal was of the view that the testimonies and data point to a broader failure of oversight and a deliberate resistance to reform, reinforcing the urgent need for stronger consumer protections and accountability in the cryptocurrency space.

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