In the White House Tether, Bo Hines, and NXUM Bo Hines, President Trump’s bizarre choice [I72] to serve as the first executive director of his crypto advisory council, was among the key architects of the Genius Act, the stablecoin law signed in July 2025. Hines’ previous qualifications consisted of playing college football, losing two Congressional races, and co-owning a small consulting firm called NXUM with his father. He kept his stake in NXUM when he joined the administration. The Wall Street Journal has now reported that weeks after Hines began working on the bill, his father and their fellow NXUM co-owner Gary Dennis met with Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino. Tether is the largest stablecoin issuer, and had the most riding on the legislation. Though NXUM previously had little involvement with the crypto sector, it pitched Tether on a “strategic lobbying” and PR campaign that has netted NXUM at least $6.3 million to date, with payments that began while Hines was still at the White House and were split three ways among the co-owners. The final deal omitted any mention of lobbying, and was routed through a separate marketing firm.

Meanwhile, Hines pushed legislators to double the grace period for crypto exchanges to stop offering noncompliant stablecoins — a change that primarily benefited Tether. He also remained active in Signal chats with his NXUM partners. When some Republican congresspeople stalled the bill, his father informed Dennis he’d gotten a “very worried” call from Ardoino and that Tether wanted them to “obliterate” the holdouts. Hours later, Hines sent the NXUM group chat talking points casting the legislators as “undermining the president and ... bought and paid for by democratic shills like coinbase and a16z”. When Trump brokered a deal with the holdouts weeks later, Dennis bragged to an associate, “Bo got it done.” Three weeks after the bill was signed, Hines left the White House; the following month, he was named CEO of Tether’s new US arm. NXUM has only grown more entangled with Tether since. The consulting firm, which is pitching investors on a deal in which Tether would buy a 25% stake for $56 million, has started branding itself as the “strategic media infrastructure layer behind Tether”. It also helped launch the Fellowship PAC, which is chaired by Jesse Spiro, Tether US’s head of government affairs [Tether PAC]. The PAC is funded almost entirely by Cantor Fitzgerald, an investor in Tether and its primary US financial partner, which was previously run by now-Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick. The PAC has paid NXUM more than $6.5 million. Before it launched, Dennis reminded an associate: “Again, no link to Tether, Nxum, Bo”.

Hines was succeeded on the crypto council by Patrick Witt, whose resume likewise featured college football and failed congressional bids [I90]. Witt took over negotiations on the Clarity Act crypto market structure bill, which recently fizzled after falling short of the votes needed for cloture [I110]. In July, the council’s deputy director, Harry Jung, stepped down to join (you guessed it!) NXUM.1 Now, Witt has left his post, presumably to collect his reward. I look forward to learning who’s paying it. His departure adds to growing nerves in the crypto sector that the White House is losing interest. David Sacks stepped down from his combined “AI and crypto czar” role in March, and earlier this month Trump tapped Jay Clayton to become his AI czar.2 No crypto czar has been named, and the digital assets advisory council is now without a director or deputy director. The Clarity Act is dead, with little hope of being revived after the midterms. If I were among the crypto executives whose money has fueled more than $250 million in super PAC election spending since 2024, I might also be a little worried that the administration got what it needed from me and is now moving on to newer, shinier things.3

Diagram showing how former White House crypto council officials Bo Hines and Harry Jung connect to the consulting firm NXUM, Tether and Tether US, the Fellowship PAC, Cantor Fitzgerald, and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, including payments of $6.3M+ from Tether and $6.5M+ from the PAC to NXUM, and a loan from Tether to Lutnick.