The Securities and Exchange Commission, overseen by crypto millionaire Paul Atkins, just agreed to drop its lawsuit against the cryptocurrency exchange Ripple after Biden-era regulators sued the firm for alleged securities fraud. Ripple, which will still have to pay a $125 million fine, gave $4.9 million to Trump’s inauguration in January and paid nearly $800,000 to lobby the federal government in the first half of fiscal 2025. That included $260,000 spent lobbying on issues related to crypto regulation paid to DC’s newly crowned lobbying king, Ballard Partners.
Ballard Partners was founded in 1998 by wealthy conservative donor Brian Ballard — a major MAGA fundraiser since Trump’s first campaign. Ballard Partners also previously employed Trump’s White House chief of staff, Susie Wiles, until 2020, and his attorney general, Pam Bondi, until her confirmation in January.
The firm’s clout within Trumpworld has made Ballard the highest-earning lobbying shop in the United States, raking in more than $20 million just last quarter from clients clamoring to get the ear of the White House. (It’s overtaken powerhouse Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck, which has long used DC’s revolving door to help its corporate and oligarch clients.) If Ballard Partners’ luck continues, its annual revenues will rival those of small government agencies — a “lobbying gusher,” Politico reports, crowning “a new set of power brokers in Trump’s swamp.”
Ballard’s clients include American Express Global Business Travels, which recently scored a win when Bondi’s Justice Department canceled a challenge to its planned $540 million acquisition of a competitor. The move came after the financial giant paid Ballard Partners $200,000 to lobby Bondi’s agency on antitrust and other matters this year.
Ballard also does business with UnitedHealth, which has paid the firm more than any other lobbying group this year as part of a $7.8 million spending…
Auteur: Veronica Riccobene
