Billionaire Investor Sues Trump Crypto Firm Over “Criminal Extortion”

Justin Sun, a Chinese national accused of fraud who invested $75 million in President Trump’s crypto firm after his election victory, is now suing the shady venture, which he says is “on the brink of collapse.” 

Sun’s lawsuit alleges that the company unjustifiably froze all of his tokens, blocking him from voting on any proposals, and threatened to burn them. 

Sun noted that he remains an “ardent supporter of President Trump and his Administration’s efforts to make America crypto friendly,” regardless of the lawsuit, even asserting that Trump might not have known, and would have blocked the move if he did.  

“I have tried in good faith to resolve this situation with the World Liberty project team without resorting to litigation. But the project team has refused my requests to unfreeze my tokens and restore my rights as a token holder. They have left me with no choice but to turn to the courts,” he wrote Tuesday on X. 

Sun’s lawsuit also alleges “criminal extortion,” claiming that World Liberty attempted to force ⁠Sun to mint and push its dollar-pegged stablecoin, USD1, on his TRON blockchain network. When Sun refused their advances, WLF retaliated against him, the lawsuit states. WLF has yet to comment. 

This isn’t Sun’s first time dipping his toe into the waters of questionable crypto investment schemes. In 2023, he was charged with marketing unregistered securities and “fraudulently manipulating the secondary market” for a cryptocurrency token “through extensive wash trading,” which, as Popular Information puts it, is “the simultaneous or near-simultaneous purchase and sale of a security to make it appear actively traded without an actual change in beneficial ownership.” He was also charged with paying B-list celebrities like Jake Paul, Soulja Boy, and Lindsey Lohan to endorse his crypto token “without disclosing their compensation.” But that all went away when Trump came back into office and asked the Securities and Exchange Commission to end the case. Now it seems like Sun is getting a taste of his own medicine.