GOP Presidential Candidate Vivek Ramaswamy To Accept Bitcoin Donations For Campaign

Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy has announced that he is officially accepting donations in Bitcoin for his campaign, making him the second U.S. presidential candidate to do so.

"Give $1," the GOP candidate said while speaking at Bitcoin 2023 in Miami, Florida.

"Let's make the 2024 election a referendum on fiat currency," he added.

The GOP candidate's announcement came just days after Robert F. Kennedy Jr. became the first presidential candidate in U.S. history to accept campaign donations in Bitcoin, according to Cointelegraph.

During his speech, Ramaswamy had a QR code displayed onscreen that could be used by eligible U.S. citizens and permanent residents to make campaign donations.

The QR code will reportedly direct users to a payment gateway and offer them various payment options including BTC and satoshis.

Donors can make contributions of up to $6,600 for Ramaswamy's campaign and will be rewarded with a nonfungible token (NFT).

Ramaswamy recently mentioned a proposal to curb tax restrictions on Bitcoin in the U.S.

"The thriving Bitcoin universe should actually better empower me to do what I want to do as the U.S. president, which is to stabilize the U.S. dollar as a unit of measurement and put the Federal Reserve back in its place with that as its single mandate," the entrepreneur-turned-politician told CBS News ahead of Bitcoin 2023.

Ramaswamy clarified that he does not plan to launch his own NFTs for personal profit or campaign fundraising but is simply giving his supporters an option to make donations through Bitcoin.

"Right now, I'm more focused on policy. It also just gives people the choice to donate to the campaign in Bitcoin and signal that we're not threatened by it," the pro-crypto candidate told the outlet.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. also gave a speech at Bitcoin 2023 in what was his first public appearance as a presidential candidate. He shared his own experiences with Bitcoin at the conference and said lawmakers should find ways to develop it instead of trying to obstruct it, according to Bitcoin Magazine.

"As president, I will make sure that your right to hold and use Bitcoin is inviolable," Kennedy said. "I am an ardent defender and lifelong defender of civil liberties and Bitcoin is both an exercise and a guarantee of those freedoms."