Pro-Trump activist Douglass Mackey was arrested in Florida on January 27, 2021, for allegedly spreading misinformation, posting hate online, and conspiring to threaten or intimidate voters in the 2016 presidential election.
According to the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), he's now received $60,000 worth of Bitcoin in an anonymous donation.
According to the SPLC, a legal defense fund was created by his “friends and supporters.” The SPLC said that “less than two days after this social media push began on the evening of March 11, 2021, an anonymous donor sent Mackey 1.026178 Bitcoin, then worth roughly $58,600.”
“Donors have sent around $63,450 in total to the address listed on Mackey's legal fund since March 11,” they added.
The far-right’s love affair with Bitcoin
This is not the first time the flagship cryptocurrency has been embroiled in fundraising schemes for far-right conspiracists.
“The promotional blitz around Mackey's legal fundraiser attracted donors with apparent ties to the multiple wings of the far-right,” the SPLC added.
The SPLC also found that one Bitcoin donor sent money to addresses that were associated with the National Alliance, a white supremacist and neo-Nazi political group founded in 1974. The SPLC's analysis found that this donor had sent approximately $190 worth of Bitcoin to the National Alliance on January 4, two days prior to the Capitol Hill riots.
Bitcoin wasn't just sent to far-right conspiracists during the Capitol Hill riots in January 2021, it partly funded the riots themselves.
According to data analytics firm Chainalysis, a donor sent $522,000 worth of Bitcoin to 22 separate addresses, many of which belonged to “far-right activists and internet personalities” that were present during the riots.
The firm claimed the funds came from a deceased computer programmer in France, who left a suicide note to explain his actions.
“I care about what happens after my death. That's why I decided to leave my modest wealth to certain causes and people,” the note read.