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Former Democratic Texas gubernatorial candidate Beto O'Rourke’s campaign claims they returned a $1 million campaign donation from Sam Bankman-Fried of FTX.

The donation to the O’Rourke campaign was the tip of the iceberg. Bankman-Fried personally poured over $40 million in mid-term donations mainly to boost Democrat campaigns. 

The CEO and FTX co-founders, Ryan Salame and Nishad Singh have collectively spent about $71 million on the election cycle. The massive contributions coincided with a big effort to lobby Congress for cryptocurrency.  And FTX and other crypto companies were hoping to avoid a regulatory crackdown.

In early November, Bankman-Fried resigned as CEO. The Bahamas-based FTX was at the time the largest cryptocurrency exchange by volume. And it had over 1 million users when it filed for bankruptcy. The disgraced ex-CEO of FTX is currently deep in controversy over the company's collapse.

Pressure mounts for return of Bankman-Fried donations

Lawmakers who received the campaign donations are being pressured to return the money.

O'Rourke reports that the $1 million received on October 11 was returned four days before Election Day. And they gave back the funds before the FTX scandal hit the headlines.

"This contribution was unsolicited, and the campaign’s upcoming [Texas Ethics Commission] report will show that it was returned on Nov. 4, before the news stories that would later come out about the donor," said a spokesman for O'Rourke.

Filings disclose that Bankman-Fried's $1 million donation made him the top donor to O'Rourke's campaign between July 1 and Sept. 29. 

House Financial Services Committee plans hearings

House Financial Services Committee Chairwoman Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA), said in November that her committee will hold hearings in December to investigate the collapse of FTX.

Bankman-Fried and his associates have given roughly $300,000 to nine members sitting on that committee that will be investigating them.

Fox Business asked Waters whether Democrats should return campaign money they received from Bankman-Fried. 

"Well, I don't want to get into that," she responded. "As a matter of fact, both sides, Democrats and Republicans, have received donations. So, thank you."

A bipartisan letter in March from 8 House members (four Democrats and four Republicans) questioned the SEC about making informal inquiries to crypto and blockchain companies. And said that such requests could violate federal law. ·

5 of the 8 had received direct campaign donations from FTX. Ted Budd, a Democrat got $517,000 from a SuperPAC set up by FTX co-CEO Ryan Salame. Tom Emmer, a Republican, who ran the NRCC, received a whopping $2.75 million for the House GOP Super PAC from Salame & FTX.

An estimated $1 billion of FTX client money is missing.

$300 million was cashed out by Sam Bankman-Fried. $121 million can be traced to his parents purchase of 19 NFT’s. And at least $70M was traced to political campaign donations.