Ripple CEO alleges Senator Lummis canceled meeting, won't reschedule
Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse has claimed that Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-WY) — who chairs the Digital Assets Subcommittee — cancelled a meeting with him and won't reschedule.
The billionaire CEO, well-known for leading the blockchain and payments firm Ripple, urged Sen. Lummis, as "a leader in Congress and Senator from one of the most crypto-friendly states," to be "a leader for ALL of crypto." He invited Sen. Lummis to join him either virtually or onstage for a conversation to fulfill the Trump administration's goal of making the U.S. the crypto capital of the world.
Sen. Lummis is a well-known crypto advocate who introduced the BITCOIN Act to establish a strategic Bitcoin reserve.
Ripple CEO also told his followers on X that he was heading to Washington to support the "sensible pro-crypto" stablecoin and market structure legislation. He added that he was very encouraged to see the elected officials look at crypto as a multichain industry, "as it should be."
A stablecoin is a type of cryptocurrency that is created to maintain a stable value, unlike traditionally volatile cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin. It is usually pegged to a traditional currency like the US dollar or a commodity like gold. On Dec. 17, 2024, Ripple also launched its stablecoin Ripple USD (RLUSD).
Note that the Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins (GENIUS) Act is expected to be debated in the Senate on May 19. Introduced by Sen. Bill Hagerty (R-TN), the bill is sponsored by Senators Cynthia Lummis, Tim Scott (R-SC), and Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY).
The GENIUS bill has faced roadblocks — most notably due to Democrats, including Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), opposing it — owing to President Donald Trump-linked USD1 stablecoin.
Ripple has been making news on multiple fronts of late.
The firm's ongoing securities violations case faced a shocking turn on May 15 as the court denied its settlement motion. On the other hand, it marked a positive turn of events on May 19 as the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) launched XRP futures.
As per Kraken, XRP was trading at $2.37 at the time of writing.
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Yahoo
24 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Ex-GOP Congressman David Jolly Announces Run For Florida Governor, As A Democrat
The first major candidate to announce a run for the Democratic nomination for Florida governor is a former Republican member of Congress who could possibly roll through the primary without a serious challenge. David Jolly, who served three years in the House representing a Tampa Bay district and is likely best known now as an MSNBC contributor, on Thursday announced his bid to become the first Democrat in Tallahassee's governor's mansion since Buddy MacKay held the job for three weeks finishing out the term of Lawton Chiles, who died in late 1998. 'Something is happening in Florida,' Jolly told HuffPost, describing the town-hall style meetings he has held around the state, including in solidly Republican areas, over the past several months. 'We've got a shot in this governor's race.' MacKay, who had been Chiles' lieutenant governor, lost to Republican Jeb Bush in November 1998, and a Republican has held Florida's governorship ever since. The closest Democrats have come to winning over that stretch was 2018, when Tallahassee mayor Andrew Gillum came within 32,000 votes of defeating then-congressman Ron DeSantis. DeSantis won reelection, however, by 19 points over Charlie Crist, another Republican-turned-Democrat. Jolly said he and Crist came to the Democratic Party quite differently. While Crist has said that the Republican Party left him by moving away from his values, Jolly said he over the years changed his views on issues ranging from gun control to abortion. He left the Republican Party in 2018, after its takeover by President Donald Trump, but was an independent for seven years before formally registering as a Democrat in late April. 'I test the theory in politics: Is it OK to change your mind?' he said. 'I think I reflect where a lot of voters are.' Nikki Fried, the chair of the Florida Democratic Party and the last Democrat to serve on the elected Cabinet as agriculture commissioner, said that it was conceivable that no well-known Democrat will enter the race between now and the qualifying deadline next year. Whether that happens or not, though, Jolly has his work cut out for him to persuade hardcore Democrats in Florida that he truly is one of them. 'He will need validators from the progressive community…. There is some skepticism in the Black community,' said Fried, who herself ran for governor in 2022 but lost the primary to Crist. She added, though, that Jolly has impressed her thus far with his willingness to go everywhere and to talk to everyone. 'He is showing up,' she said. Crist held two elected statewide positions before running for governor as a Republican in 2006. He decided to run for U.S. Senate in 2010, but was on course to losing that primary to Marco Rubio, leading him to leave the GOP and run as an independent. Rubio ended up winning the Senate seat and Crist two years later became a Democrat. He ran for governor again in 2014 against then-incumbent Rick Scott and came within 1 percentage point of winning. From there, he ran for Congress against Jolly in 2016, beating him and serving three terms before leaving to run for governor again in 2022 against DeSantis, getting crushed this time. Fried said Jolly probably has a better chance at winning than Crist did, particularly if the mood of the electorate is similar to what it was in 2018, when Trump had energized Democrats everywhere including Florida. 'People are willing to give him a shot,' she said of Jolly. Florida is a tough and expensive place to run for statewide office, with 11 different television markets across a thousand miles and two time zones. To win, Jolly or any Democrat would need tens of millions of dollars or more to compete, at a time when many donors may be skeptical of a state that DeSantis won in a landslide in 2022 and Trump won easily in 2024. Florida's term limits disallow another four years for DeSantis, although his wife, Casey, is considering a run while GOP House member and outspoken Trump ally Byron Donalds announced his candidacy in February. Jolly, though, said that Democrats nationally understand the importance of Florida in the elections to come given that the 2030 Census will likely give Florida and Texas four more House districts between them and thus a near-lock on the Electoral College unless Democrats can put at least one of them in play. 'If we win the governor's race in '26, the road to the White House runs through Florida in 2028,' he said. Republicans, even anti-Trump ones who would love to see Jolly win, say that is a sizeable 'if.' 'I think his only path even to the Democratic nomination is a large and steady influx of soft money and outside support,' said one Republican consultant who spoke on condition of anonymity. 'He will need to catch lightning in a bottle to get the small-donor national network engaged to help him, and they won't be as likely to give to a very recent Democrat.' Mac Stipanovich, a decadeslong Republican who left the party after Trump's rise, agreed that Jolly faces a steep hill. 'The fundamentals, and, therefore, the odds, are against him. He will need to run a well-funded, nearly error-free campaign and be lucky to boot, catching some breaks beyond his control,' he said.
Indianapolis Star
31 minutes ago
- Indianapolis Star
Forget wheat pennies. How many Indiana pennies are in your couch cushions?
As the U.S. phases out production of pennies, you might be checking your couch cushions or your vacuum for coins that could be worth more than one cent. You also may want to keep an eye out for these redesigned pennies made in 2009 for the bicentennial anniversary of Abraham Lincoln's birth. They may not be worth millions, but they commemorate the time the 16th president spent in Indiana. In 2009, Congress authorized pennies designed to commemorate four locations in Lincoln's geographical history. The four coins also recognized the 100th anniversary of the first year the Lincoln cent was produced. "Abraham Lincoln was born in Kentucky, grew to adulthood in Indiana, achieved fame in Illinois and led the nation in Washington, D.C.," the law reads. Indiana's coin shows a young Lincoln sitting on a log, reading a book. It's meant to depict his time in Indiana from 1816 to 1830. "The design on this coin captures this part of Lincoln's life by showing him reading while he takes a break from his work as a rail splitter," according to the U.S. Mint website. Read about all four coins in the Lincoln Bicentennial One Cent Program at The federal government made its final order of penny blanks in May 2025 — the first step to end the production of the 1-cent coin, a spokesperson for the Treasury Department confirmed to USA TODAY. "The United States Mint will continue to manufacture pennies while an inventory of penny blanks exists," the spokesperson said. The agency did not specify how long the inventory was expected to last, so it's unclear exactly when pennies will no longer be in circulation. Blanks are flat metal discs that eventually become coins, according to the U.S. Mint. In February, Trump instructed the Treasury Department to stop minting the low-value coins. 'For far too long the United States has minted pennies which literally cost us more than 2 cents. This is so wasteful!' Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social. Elon Musk, who has started to scale back his work as head of Trump's Department of Government Efficiency, said in January that penny production in fiscal year 2023 cost taxpayers more than $179 million. In fiscal year 2024, it took 3.7 cents to produce and distribute one penny, according to the 2024 U.S. Mint report. The 2024 cost was up by 20% from the previous year, according to the report. The report said the increase was partly driven by the rising costs of metals like zinc and copper. Similarly, the nickel costs 13.8 cents to produce, according to the U.S. Mint. Penny production: What's next for the penny? The details on US decision to end production So-called "wheat pennies" get their name from the back of the coin having stalks of wheat encircling the "One Cent" text. They were produced from 1909 to 1958. After that, the wheat stalks were shorn and pennies began displaying an engraving of the Lincoln Memorial. Most Lincoln wheat pennies are not super-valuable and are worth just a few cents more than one cent. However, some may escalate into the hundreds of dollars, depending on the condition and when minted. Certain vintages, especially with minting errors, may be worth thousands. You can see the NGC price guide here.
Miami Herald
36 minutes ago
- Miami Herald
Jolly enters governor's race as a Democrat: ‘The Free State of Florida is a lie'
David Jolly, the former Tampa-area congressman who left the Republican Party seven years ago, is holding court with the press in an Aventura Hilton conference room, rolling out an announcement that everyone knows is coming: He's running for governor as a Democrat. 'We have an affordability crisis in the state that has people from all walks of life questioning whether or not they can continue to live in Florida,' says the 52-year-old attorney and father of two kids, ages 6 and 4. 'I think the affordability crisis is hitting everyone from every walk of life, and I think there's a strong case to be made that Republicans have largely created this environment.' Jolly is the first Democrat of note to launch a campaign ahead of the November 2026 election, despite joining the party only six weeks ago. For the Republicans, U.S. Rep. Byron Donalds is running with President Donald Trump's endorsement, and Florida first lady Casey DeSantis is mulling her own campaign to succeed her term-limited husband. Jolly, who left Congress in 2017 and registered without party affiliation a year later, has been on something of a charm offensive of late. He has been traveling the state and meeting with voters in churches to raise his profile and listen to frustrations with Florida's Republican-dominated government. 'This is a home for the rich and the reckless under [Gov.] Ron DeSantis,' he says. Politically, Jolly is moving in the opposite direction of the state he wants to lead. Florida is becoming more Republican, voting for Trump in the last three presidential elections. Miami-Dade County, where Jolly, the son of a Southern Baptist minister, lived as a young boy, voted for a Republican president for the first time since 1988. But in a wide-ranging, half-hour interview, Jolly said Floridians are waking up to the other trends in Florida under Republican rule: The Sunshine State is becoming less affordable, less tolerant and less accommodating to those who don't share the governor's religious and ideological beliefs. 'The 'Free state of Florida,'' Jolly said, 'is a lie.' Political handicappers aren't likely to give Jolly — or any Democrat — much of a chance to win in 2026, even with an open governor's seat up for grabs. Republicans now control every statewide elected position and hold super-majorities in the state Legislature. Active GOP voters outnumber active registered Democrats by more than 1.2 million. Even Jason Pizzo, Florida Democrats' former Senate leader — whose district includes the Hilton where Jolly met with reporters Monday — declared the Democratic Party 'dead' when he announced in April that he was registering as an independent ahead of his own planned run for governor. Jolly, who lives in the Gulf Coast town of Belleair Bluffs with his wife and kids, also shares some common threads with the most recent Democratic candidate for governor: Charlie Crist, a former Republican governor and ex-congressman from the Tampa Bay area who lost by nearly 20 points to DeSantis in 2022. Jolly knows Crist well, having lost his Pinellas County seat in the U.S. House of Representatives to the former governor in 2016. 'Charlie would always say, 'I didn't leave the party. The party left me,'' Jolly said, explaining how his political experience is different. 'I left the Republican Party. I changed.' What follows are exchanges from Jolly's interview with the Miami Herald, edited for brevity and clarity. Q: Why in this environment today, in Florida, are you running for governor as a Democrat? A: I'm running for governor because we have an affordability crisis in the state that has people from all walks of life questioning whether or not they can continue to live in Florida. That is a lived experience for my wife and I. We have two young kids, 6 and 4. I think the affordability crisis is hitting everyone from every walk of life, and I think there's a strong case to be made that Republicans have largely created this environment, refused to do anything about it, and I hope to change that. Q: You were Republican, you became independent, and now you are full on embracing the Democratic ideas. How do you tell people that we should believe you now? A: Charlie [Crist] would always say, 'I didn't leave the party. The party left me.' I left the Republican Party. I changed. I tested a different theory in politics. Is it okay to change your mind? Is it okay to grow? … That journey was a 10-year journey, not a 10-month journey … I supported, as a Republican, marriage equality, gun control, climate change, campaign finance reform. Republicans didn't want me. Democrats didn't need me. I conflated religious beliefs with being anti Roe [v. Wade] when I entered politics. That's true. I also, though, was someone looking for solutions. I was the only Republican in Congress to vote against the Planned Parenthood investigation, the only one when Republicans moved to defund it. I offered a compromise to move the money to community health centers so that there would be a continuation of care in communities across Florida and across the country. It wasn't really a pivot for me to register as a Democrat. I had kind of been there all along — not all along — but you know, during my [no-party-affiliated] years, I was an ally of the Democratic Party. So it has not been a significant pivot. Q: What are your thoughts on the current state of Florida Ron DeSantis has created? A: This is where it's a lived experience. We have a 6 and 4 year old. We wrestle with the question, 'Do we raise our kids in Florida?' This is a home for the rich and the reckless under Ron DeSantis. Whether that's because he favors developers, he favors the billionaires over the working class, whether it's because he ignores public health … denies science where it matters. Whether it's his attack on academia, whether it's his notion that he wants to divide us over who we love or who we worship … The implicit biases behind the DeSantis administration are ugly, they're gross … The 'Free state of Florida' is a lie. We've got a shot to change this. Q: From your perspective, what have [Democrats] gotten wrong? A: I've run more campaigns than I've been a candidate in so I know national Democrats and state Democrats have failed to meet voters where they're at. This is not a federal race. This is about the affordability crisis, education vouchers, corruption in Tallahassee. If Democrats start talking about Donald Trump in the governor's race, we lose. This race isn't about Donald Trump. It's arguably not about DeSantis. It's about the direction DeSantis has taken us. And so part of that is just kind of messaging. Are we on the right message for where voters are? Q: Democrats have a serious problem in South Florida with the Hispanic vote. How do you plan to handle that? A: We have to build a coalition that is broad and deep in communities across the state that includes socioeconomic, demographic subject matter, regional. We have to build and invest in communities where people believe in change. I do think in the past, Democrats have been too hesitant to condemn the regime, to condemn communism, to condemn socialism. We can embrace capitalism that has fair rules that allow for opportunity for all people. We can condemn the regime but lift up the Cuban people. That is true of Venezuela, to Haitian Americans and others. … If we can change a conversation on this in Florida, we've changed it nationally. Republicans for too long have succeeded in conflating immigration with crime. It's ugly, it's xenophobic, it's wrong and it's immoral. We can recognize and celebrate the contribution of immigrants, their contribution to our economy, their contributions to our culture. Lift them up. Celebrate them. Welcome them. Q: How does Jason Pizzo play into the upcoming elections? A: I'm going to say something you don't hear a lot of Democrats say. I have enormous respect for Jason Pizzo because he followed his political convictions. I didn't know Jason Pizzo 90 days ago. This isn't an area that I'm from. I disagree with him when he says the Democratic Party is 'dead.' I think the Democratic Party is alive and well and capable of winning next November. But I'm not going to criticize Jason … My job is to build a coalition that he can believe in and everyone else can. Q: You alluded to the Hope Florida scandal, what's your take? A: It sure appears criminal, and I think an investigation is merited, and I think investigation is likely being obstructed by Republican allies of the governor. And I think it's clear that $10 million was stolen from the Medicaid program. I think the governor and First Lady are reacting with vanity, which doesn't surprise me, and they'd be smart to just shut up. Q: What do you think of DeSantis' immigration blueprint? A: When Ron DeSantis plays theater with our migrant community, putting them on planes, sending them to Martha's Vineyard, or using tax dollars to go to Texas to grab a plane or whatever he was doing, that is just ugly, immoral behavior, and should be condemned. Q: Should Florida force local law enforcement to join the 287(g) task force program? A: The federal government has a responsibility to provide for immigration enforcement. That's just the reality … My concern is that I think Republicans are just racing to embrace the president in a way that it's skipping over due process, skipping over funding, it's ignoring enforcement in criminal justice in other areas where local law enforcement should be looking … I think it's just a matter of getting it right. Q: And the affordability crisis that you're talking about specifically is housing? A: It is largely driven by housing costs, access to housing, contributed to mainly by the property-insurance crisis and the property-tax crisis. But I think we need big and bold changes … I think we need a CAT fund for property insurance, a state catastrophic fund that removes hurricane and natural disaster risks from the private market. You can actually reduce private insurance by about 60% if you do that in a lot of policies. Q: Are you not prepared to offer a property tax solution because you don't have one yet, or because you just don't want to let it out today? A: I believe we need property tax reform, but I believe it needs to be sober, reflect math, reflect revenue needs, include experts and economic growth and a real study, and then ultimately put those proposals in front of the voters, so that voters can decide. I don't have a 10-point-plan on property-tax relief, but I think it is something that we need to do. I'm glad Tallahassee is talking about it. I just think they're talking about it with a level of irresponsibility that should concern us. Q: Are any of our local billionaires endorsing you? A: I'm gonna leave that for next week. … we do have many of the traditional Democratic donors, supporters, electeds, former electeds … We have built a broad coalition.
