The former President of the United States Donald Trump has pledged to grant Silk Road founder Ross Ulbricht with a presidential pardon if he is re-elected in November’s election.
“If you vote for me, on day one I will commute the sentence of Ross Ulbircht,” Trump stated at the Libertarian Party’s National Convention in Washington on May 25.
“He’s already served 11 years, we’re going to get him home,” he said of the creator of Silk Road — which is known as the first modern darknet market with a payment system built on Bitcoin (BTC).
Silk Road started in 2011 and was run and operated by Ulbricht from his personal laptop under the username “Dread Pirate Roberts.” On Oct. 1, 2013, the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) seized the laptop.
Ulbricht was convicted in a U.S. federal court in 2015 for various charges relating to the operations of the Silk Road. He was sentenced to two life terms plus forty years and no possibility of parole.
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Trump also addressed his pro-crypto stance, after his changing his tune on digital assets earlier this year.
“I will ensure that the future of crypto and the future of Bitcoin will be made in the USA, not driven overseas,” he said, before promising to protect those who choose to hold their crypto assets outside centralized crypto exchanges.
“I will support the right to self-custody, to the nation’s 50 million crypto holders I say this with your vote, I will keep Elizabeth Warren and her goons away from your Bitcoin,” he added, a vastly different tone to when he was calling Bitcoin a scam during his tenure as president.
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