NEWS & RESEARCH
While serving as the Trump administration’s top crypto adviser in 2025, Bo Hines, was co-owner of a small consulting firm that was being paid by crypto industry giant Tether with a deep interest in the passage of the so-called Genius Act. Few companies had more riding on that law than Tether, the El Salvador-based issuer of USDT, which accounts for roughly 60% of the $300 billion global stablecoin market. The Act established the first federal rules for stablecoins, a type of cryptocurrency tied to real-world assets such as the US dollar. Critically for Tether, it also decided whether and how the company could operate in the US. Hines also pressed lawmakers to give stablecoin companies three years to comply with the new rules instead of 18 months—a change that chiefly benefited Tether—and the final law included what critics dubbed the “Tether loophole,” a path for foreign issuers to operate in the US if the Treasury deems their home regulator comparable.
A Wall Street Journal investigation found that Tether was steering money to Nxum, a small consulting firm that Hines had cofounded with his father and another partner, each holding a one-third stake. Hines remained a co-owner while in the White House, and messages reviewed by the Journal suggest he never truly let go. While serving a Trump’s advisor, Hines traded updates on the Genius Act in a Nxum group chat on Signal, feeding his partners talking points while they were in touch with Tether’s chief executive. Peter Vincer, the marketing entrepreneur who brokered the Tether deal, says Hines personally assured him that he would get a cut of Tether’s payments once the contract moved to Nxum. In May 2025, the first $2.49 million installment was routed through Vincer’s marketing company while Hines was still in the White House, and was split three ways at Nxum. Trump signed the Genius Act in July 2025. Three weeks later, Hines left government at which point Tether began paying Nxum directly, bringing the total to about $6.3 million. Tether hired Hines as CEO of its new US division. Hines has since traded up his $1.4 million home to one costing $3.3 million, and he, his father, and their business partner began traveling by private jet.
SOURCES: Wall Street Journal | Fortune | Bloomberg
ANALYSIS & OPINION
Federal law (18 U.S.C. § 208) makes it a crime for executive branch officials to participate in government matters that would affect their own financial interests, and according to Cynthia Brown, senior ethics counsel at the watchdog group CREW, most officials avoid that trap “by divesting their prior business interests entirely.” Hines did the opposite: He kept his share of Nxum while steering a bill that would decide the fate of the firm’s biggest paying client, a textbook conflict of interest that Sen. Blumenthal says “implicates federal ethics, anticorruption, and lobbying laws.” Nxum insists Hines never saw a dime of Tether money while in office, but that defense does little work, because the money flowed to a firm he co-owned with his father, and every dollar Tether paid Nxum made his stake worth more. And why would Tether choose Nxum in the first place? The world’s largest stablecoin issuer could have hired any consultancy in Washington; instead, it signed a multimillion-dollar deal with a tiny family firm whose résumé consisted of managing social media accounts for right-wing influencers, a marijuana-themed line of digital collectibles that never got off the ground, and a failed Trump meme coin. But Nxum had one obvious asset: a co-owner running crypto policy in the White House. And the way the deal was structured suggests everyone involved understood how it would look. While Hines was in government, Tether paid through a middleman, Vincer’s marketing company, which passed the money on to Nxum; once Hines left, Tether began paying Nxum directly. Blumenthal says that this payment structure suggests Tether “was likely well aware of the illegality and impropriety” of paying a sitting White House official. Later, Nxum offered Vincer $311,000 plus 21% of a future Tether payment never to speak about the deal or the Hines family. The episode also fits a pattern of Trump and his officials cashing in on crypto while in office.
SOURCES: Wall Street Journal | Fortune | Bloomberg
HOW TO FIX IT
Federal action:
Reintroduce and pass the Anti-Corruption and Public Integrity Act, which would require senior officials and White House staff to divest assets that pose conflicts of interest, like Hines’s stake in Nxum. Current law lets officials keep such stakes as long as they step aside on related matters. The bill would also bar companies from immediately hiring officials from offices they recently lobbied, and prohibit the largest companies from hiring them for four years, closing the revolving door Hines walked through to Tether. Additionally, it would create an independent agency to enforce these rules, which today are policed by White House lawyers and a Justice Department that answers to the president.
Pass the Anti-Corruption Bureau Creation Act, which would create a new civil offense—corrupt enrichment—letting citizens and state attorneys general sue officials to recover gains tied to misuse of office, including profits from insider knowledge or payments from parties seeking favors. It would also create an independent enforcer of federal ethics law that doesn’t answer to the president.
Reintroduce, strengthen and pass the Executive Branch Conflict of Interest Act, which would bar senior officials from taking any action that directly or substantially benefits a company or client they worked for in the previous two years. As written, the bill wouldn’t have stopped Hines, because the Genius Act benefited Tether, Nxum’s client, not Nxum itself. Lawmakers should close that gap by extending the ban to the paying clients of any firm an official owns.
Pass the BEACON Act, which would create an independent inspector general for the Executive Office of the President, the one corner of the executive branch without a watchdog of its own. Today, ethics problems among White House staff like Hines are handled by the White House’s own lawyers. An inspector general could have investigated his dealings with Nxum while he was still in office, reported them to Congress and referred them for prosecution, instead of leaving reporters to uncover them more than a year after he left.
Have the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations open a formal investigation. In October 2026, as part of an ongoing inquiry by the subcommittee’s minority members, Sen. Blumenthal demanded that Tether and Nxum turn over their contracts, payment records and messages. But a minority inquiry can only request documents, and the companies are free to ignore it. A full subcommittee investigation could issue subpoenas and force them to comply.
Open a Justice Department investigation into whether Hines violated the federal conflict-of-interest law (18 U.S.C. § 208) by steering the Genius Act while holding a stake in a firm Tether was paying, and whether his financial disclosures fully reported his Nxum interests. Most federal crimes carry a five-year statute of limitations, so if this Justice Department declines to act, a future one could still bring charges until about 2030.
Legislation: S. 5315 - Anti-Corruption and Public Integrity Act | S. 5183 - Anti-Corruption Bureau Creation Act | H.R. 244 - Executive Branch Conflict of Interest Act | H.R. 4557 - BEACON Act
