Democrats in the US Senate have continued to blame Binance and asked the Treasury and Justice departments to investigate its compliance with sanctions and protections against illicit finance following reports of possible terrorism financing.
Nine senators, including some who played a key role in negotiating crypto industry legislation known as the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act, sent a letter to the heads of federal agencies on Friday urging them to investigate the exchange following news reports on possible violations, including claims that the company had fired some compliance personnel involved in discovering the transactions.
The latest move by Democrats follows an announcement earlier this week by Senator Richard Blumenthal, a Connecticut Democrat who is a senior member of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, that he was making inquiries about Binance and had written a letter to the company asking for information. However, neither he nor other Senate Democrats are in the majority, meaning they do not currently have control over the committee investigation.
Binance co-CEO Richard Teng has said that some of the earlier media reports were “inaccurate” and “defamatory”. A spokesperson for the company did not immediately respond to a request for comment Friday on the senators’ request, which was referred to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessant and Attorney General Pam Bondi.
“These allegations raise serious concerns that poor illicit finance controls at Binance remain a significant national security threat,” according to the Friday letter from senators including Elizabeth Warren, Ruben Gallego, Angela Alsobrooks, Mark Warner and five others.
“If large sums of money could flow through Binance to terrorist groups or sanctions evaders, our controls on illicit finance would be dangerously compromised,” he wrote in the letter.
Prevention of illicit finance in crypto is one of the issues that is still being discussed in that bill. Senator Warner has led among Democrats in demanding the elimination of legislative language on this topic.
Another unresolved issue centers on the crypto activities of US President Donald Trump and his family, which is also referenced in the letter. The lawmakers wrote that they “recognized” that Binance has ties to World Liberty Financial, the Trump-backed crypto venture behind the USD1 stablecoin. He also referenced Trump’s pardon of Binance founder Changpeng “CZ” Zhao – he had pleaded guilty and spent four months in prison related to Binance’s past issues with anti-money laundering and know-your-customer provisions.