In an event that raised $27M, Kamala Harris vowed to help grow investments in “AI and digital assets”, her first comments on crypto as the presidential nominee
The remarks extend a broader technology-industry outreach: Harris had taken a visible White House role in AI, including executive engagement, in her earlier AI policy work. Her advisers had also reportedly opened contact with major crypto companies in an effort to reset relations with the sector.
The significance is the combination of AI and digital assets in a public investment message aimed at a fundraising audience. Later coverage of outreach to crypto investors and Democratic allies suggests this was part of a sustained effort to soften the party’s relationship with the industry.
First-order effects
Crypto companies and investors receive a clearer signal that Harris’s campaign is willing to engage the sector, rather than treating digital assets solely as a regulatory problem.
AI and crypto are presented together as investment priorities; the statement itself creates no policy change or new regulatory commitment.
Second-order effects
Industry groups and pro-crypto Democratic lawmakers gain a stronger basis to press the campaign for concrete positions on market structure, oversight, and US blockchain competitiveness.
The overture raises the value of crypto-sector political engagement, as firms assess whether campaign access can translate into a more receptive policy dialogue.
Third-order effects
If this approach persists, crypto policy could become less cleanly aligned with partisan attitudes toward technology and more shaped by competition for capital, founders, and innovation claims.
Pairing AI with digital assets points toward a broader political contest over which US technology sectors merit investment support, while leaving the eventual regulatory balance uncertain.
The trend: US political campaigns are increasingly treating technology-policy positioning as both an economic agenda and a channel for donor and industry coalition-building.
NEWS: VP Harris says at a fundraiser on Wall St. that she “will encourage innovative technologies like AI and digital assets while protecting our consumers and investors.”
Cheering Harris for her “words” while her administration is literally suing Hayden's Uniswap is peak Stockholm Syndrome @haydenzadams have some self-respect, you are a builder. [image]
🦄 Kamala just said she will encourage innovative technologies like DIGITAL ASSETS I believe this is her first time referencing crypto publicly and it's in a positive way
VP Harris raised $27 million today in New York, more than she's taken in at any single event since Biden dropped out (Biden and Clooney raised $28m; Biden-Obama-Clinton was $26m) https://www.bloomberg.com/...}
👀 Progress moves slowly But it does move. There is your first formal statement, directly from Harris that is reasonably pro-digital assets. Proving that the naysayers who thought it not being in her platform was some evil plan, had no idea what they were talking about 🤷♂️
If you had told me in 2017 that crypto would be mentioned by both leading candidates for president in 2024 I would ..... not have believed you? And yet here we are (digital assets placed correctly alongside AI as emerging technologies the US must get right). This industry isn't
Lot of people mad in the comments Yes Biden has been bad for crypto and actions will speak louder than words But progress is progress, it needs to start somewhere, and should be encouraged A positive statement on the tech is more than we got under Biden and Trump presidency