Convicted crypto fraudster Sam Bankman-Fried has long had a game plan to restore his public image.
And despite it being made public last year through a court filing revealing a Google document from his email account, Bankman-Fried appears to be following his preset playbook by appearing on Tucker Carlson's show Thursday.
That appearance was all but predestined.
According to a court filing last March, Bankman-Fried drafted notes on how he could recover in the wake of orchestrating what prosecutors deemed "one of the largest financial frauds in history, stealing over $8 billion of his customers' money."
One of Bankman-Fried's ideas was to "go on Tucker Carlsen [sic], come out as a republican," emphasize his past financial support to Republicans, and "come out against the woke agenda."
"While public contributions show one thing, you see another thing including super
pacs," he noted in the document.
Now, the former FTX founder seems to be crossing off his checklist.
During his interview with Carlson, Bankman-Fried suggested that his pivot to begin financially supporting Republicans fueled his downfall.
"By late 2022, I was giving to Republicans privately as much as Democrats. And that started becoming known right around FTX’s collapse, so that probably played a role," he told Carlson.
The interview with Carlson appears wholly of Bankman-Fried's own volition—his crisis PR manager quit after the interview aired and said he was unaware of it being scheduled.
Bankman-Fried's apparent decision to stick to his game plan quickly prompted both mockery on social media and rumors that he was gunning for a pardon from President Donald Trump.
"I love how SBF's leaked legal strategy was literally 'go on tucker, become republican, get pardon' and despite the leak he's still trying. Get that bag SBF!" joked one X user.
"SBF's master plan right now is to whine that his bribes didn't work on the Democrats and go 'but I bribed the Republicans too!' and then wait expectantly," snarked one commentator.
"This is how an authentically evil person thinks. Good to see he's checking the box on one of his mendacious action items," blasted someone else.
"The first thought I had when I heard SBF went on Tucker was 'he's going to flatter Trump into a pardon,'" another person wrote, referencing the old Google doc.
"Pretty obvious that they’re running the 'get a pardon' playbook for SBF," concluded someone else. "First comes out of nowhere tweeting about government jobs, then shows up on Tucker Carlson from prison…next probably see/hear something about his parents buddying up with one of the blockchain lobbyists pushing their coins on the Hill."
Bankman-Fried's interview comes as Trump has significantly bolstered cryptocurrency, establishing a strategic Bitcoin reserve and hosting the first-ever White House Crypto Summit. But Trump has given no indication he's at all considering a pardon for Bankman-Fried.
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