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Donald Trump, once a cryptocurrency skeptic, vowed Saturday to be a “pro-bitcoin president” if elected in November, as the Republican nominee sought backing from an industry irked by US regulations.

“The Biden-Harris administration’s repression of crypto and bitcoin is wrong, and it’s very bad for our country,” Trump said to cheers at a conference in Tennessee.

The ex-president likened cryptocurrencies to the growth of the “steel industry of 100 years ago”, and said “Bitcoin stands for freedom, sovereignty and independence from government coercion and control.”

Trump said if he was in the White House, he would not allow the US government to sell its bitcoin holdings.

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“This will serve in effect as the core of the strategic national bitcoin stockpile,” Trump said.

The proposal was more limited than one offered the day before by longshot third-party candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who said he would seek to build a stockpile of 4 million bitcoin.

“If we don’t embrace crypto and bitcoin technology, China will, other countries will, they’ll dominate, and we cannot let China dominate,” Trump said Saturday.

“If crypto is going to define the future, I want it to be mined, minted and made in the USA.”

Acknowledging the price of electricity as a key factor in where cryptocurrency mining operations are located, Trump vowed to make US energy the cheapest “of any nation on Earth” by increasing fossil fuel production and through nuclear energy.

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“We’ll be doing it in an environmentally friendly way, but we will be creating so much electricity that you’ll be saying, ‘please, please, Mr. President, we don’t want any more electricity.’”

He said on his first day in office, he would fire Gary Gensler, the chairman of the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), a frequent target of cryptocurrency industry outrage over his cautiously slow approach to implementing regulations.

The crowd roared with approval at the proposal, prompting Trump to joke: “I didn’t know he was that unpopular.”

“Let me say it again. On day one, I will fire Gary Gensler!” he said, with the crowd erupting again.

He also targeted Vice President Kamala Harris, who is set to replace Biden atop the Democratic ticket following the 81-year-old president’s shock exit from the campaign.

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“We have to fight and we have to win, and I pledge to the bitcoin community that the day I take the oath of office, Joe Biden, Kamala Harris’s anti-crypto crusade will be over, it will end, it’ll be done,” Trump told the crowd.

“You’re going to be very happy with me.”

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Trump said he’d lay out a plan “to ensure that the United States will be the crypto capital of the planet and the bitcoin superpower of the world.”

This plan, he said, would include firing the US Securities and Exchange Commission chair, Gary Gensler, creating a crypto presidential advisory council, blocking the creation of a central digital currency bank, and eliminating federal regulations on crypto known as “Checkpoint 2.0.”

Trump also pledged to keep 100% of all bitcoin owned by the federal government — most of which was confiscated by law enforcement — to keep as a “strategic national bitcoin stockpile.”

Trump’s opinion of bitcoin appears to have come full circle. During his presidency in 2019, Trump called bitcoin “highly volatile and based on thin air.”

“We have only one real currency in the USA, and it is stronger than ever,” Trump wrote on what was then known as Twitter. “It is called the United States Dollar!”

But Trump is now a bonafide crypto stan as he courts support from leading crypto investors. Earlier this month, Gemini co-founders and crypto investors Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss donated $250,000 to a pro-Trump super PAC.

Bitcoin prices surged after the assassination attempt on Trump earlier this month rallied his base. The currency reached a high of $62,000 as investors started betting on Trump’s return to power in November.

One of Trump’s opponents, independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr., also spoke at the conference on Friday, teasing Trump’s stockpile plans.

“I understand that tomorrow President Trump may announce his plan to build a bitcoin Fort Knox and authorize the US government to buy a million bitcoin as a strategic reserve asset,” Kennedy said. “And I applaud that announcement.”

But Kennedy said he’d go even further. The candidate would immediately sign an executive order directing the US Treasury to buy bitcoin daily and add it to the government’s current tokens until the country builds a reserve of four million bitcoin, he said.

One million bitcoin is about $69 billion, according to Coinbase. Four billion bitcoin is about $276 billion.

Trump also took the opportunity to attack the crypto position of his likely Democratic opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris. “She’s very against it,” he said. But Harris’s stance on cryptocurrency actually remains unknown. She has made no clear public comments on the issue.

The former president also promised to commute the prison sentence of Ross Ulbricht during his speech at the conference. Ulbricht is serving a life sentence for operating the Silk Road site on the dark web, which was used to sell drugs and other black market products from 2011 to 2013.

Former President and current Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump will deliver the keynote address at the world’s largest cryptocurrency conference. 

Trump will speak at the Bitcoin 2024 conference in Nashville, Tennessee on Saturday as he seeks to make cryptocurrency a wedge issue between himself and Vice President Kamala Harris, his Democratic rival.

Cryptocurrency traders hope that the former president’s keynote speech will help move Bitcoin more into the mainstream.

PRO-CRYPTO PAC LAUNCHES AHEAD OF TRUMP VISIT TO BITCOIN CONFERENCE

Trump was once a major skeptic of the cryptocurrency industry, saying in 2019, “We have only one real currency in the USA, and it is stronger than ever. It is called the United States Dollar!”

But his campaign has embraced the concept in recent years as libertarian-minded financial technology advocates have pitched crypto as an avenue of decentralizing wealth.

Trump’s running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance, brings his own crypto street cred to the presidential race. 

TRUMP BECAME COUNTRY’S ‘FIRST CRYPTO PRESIDENT’ DURING HIS FIRST YEAR IN OFFICE, FORMER CFTC REGULATOR SAYS

A staff member carries a standee of former President Donald Trump in the convention area of the Bitcoin 2024 conference. The conference, which is aimed at bitcoin enthusiasts, features multiple vendor and entertainment spaces and seminars by celebrit (Jon Cherry/Getty Images / Getty Images)

Since being elected to the Senate in 2022, he’s introduced and voted in favor of pro-crypto legislation, is a holder of the number one digital currency, Bitcoin, and has been a staunch critic of Securities and Exchange Commission chair Gary Genlser’s regulatory crackdown on digital assets.

Trump’s advisor on crypto, former GOP presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy — who is reportedly being considered for a position in Trump’s cabinet — will also be speaking at the event. It’s unclear if Vance will make an appearance.

Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. spoke to the conference on Friday.

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A person records on their phone while Independent Presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. gives a keynote speech during the Bitcoin 2024 conference. (Jon Cherry/Getty Images / Getty Images)

Trump’s participation in the conference has already materially benefited Bitcoin holders as the digital token’s price has risen approximately 4%. 

A single Bitcoin is currently worth just under $68,000, though that price fluctuates day-to-day.

Fox Business’s Eleanor Terrett contributed to this report.