The United States government is negotiating to recover $13.25 million in political donations from former FTX executives, according to new court filings.
The filing requests an extension until January 15 to continue negotiations with several political action committees (PACs), and has been approved by Judge Lewis Kaplan, who is overseeing the criminal case against former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried and his co-conspirators.
The government is seeking more time to "discuss with [the PACs] the potential recovery of funds that these organizations received from the defendant and his co-conspirators." The named PAC groups include: Senate Majority PAC, Future Forward PAC, Future Forward USA Action, Emily's List/Women Vote, and GMI PAC - all of which tend to support Democratic causes or liberal goals.
Data from OpenSecrets shows around $13.25 million was transferred to these groups from Bankman-Fried or former FTX Chief Technology Officer Nishad Singh. Singh has stated that he made the contributions at Bankman-Fried's request, sometimes even pre-signing checks for the donations. Singh recently received a sentence of community service and three years of probation after testifying against Bankman-Fried, his former friend and boss.
Future Forward PAC received $1 million under Singh's name and $5 million under Bankman-Fried's name, according to the filings. GMI PAC received $2 million, while the Senate Majority PAC (which controlled the Senate for the Democrats since January 2021) received $2 million from Singh and $1 million from Bankman-Fried. Women Vote received $2.25 million from Singh. In total, the donations to these organizations amounted to $13.25 million, and could be even higher if additional contributions were made under other donor names.
Some politicians and PACs have already returned donations from Bankman-Fried after the FTX collapse. CBS News previously reported that "most" of the organizations that received donations from Bankman-Fried planned to redirect the funds to other purposes.
