In a series of bombastic new comments on June 27, President Donald Trump didn’t just embrace the world of cryptocurrency; he claimed to be its founding father. Painting a picture of a failing industry that he single-handedly rescued, Trump cast himself as the visionary who transformed crypto into a “very powerful industry” essential for American dominance.

It’s a bold claim, especially for a man who, as recently as 2021, called Bitcoin a “scam” that was “based on thin air.”

The pivot from crypto’s highest-profile skeptic to its self-proclaimed architect is stark. Speaking at a White House press conference, Trump positioned his involvement as a long-held secret, predating his 2024 run.

“I got involved with it a couple of years ago, and before the second term,” he said. “I got involved before I decided to run… It’s become amazing. I mean, it’s the jobs that it produces, and I notice more and more of you pay in Bitcoin.”

This new narrative conveniently overlooks crypto’s actual history, which began with Bitcoin’s creation in 2009 and was shaped by innovators like Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin. Instead, Trump frames himself as the unlikely savior of crypto who saw its potential when no one else did.

“That was an industry that wasn’t doing particularly well,” Trump claimed, before making his most jaw-dropping assertion: “I’m president, and what I did do there is build an industry that’s very important.”

For those who follow the space, the U-turn is whiplash-inducing. In 2021, Trump’s main objection was that crypto was “another currency competing against the dollar,” telling Fox Business that he wanted the dollar to be “the currency of the world.”

Today, he argues the opposite.

“I mean, people are saying it takes a lot of pressure off the dollar, and it’s a great thing for our country,” Trump said.

He now frames crypto not as a threat, but as a strategic asset in a geopolitical chess match against China. “If we didn’t have it, China would,” he declared. “China would love to, and we’ve dominated that industry.”

While Trump’s rebranding may seem sudden, it follows a period of intense crypto lobbying and a series of pro-crypto moves by his administration. Since returning to the White House, Trump has fully embraced the industry, which many see as the future of finance.

This new wave of financial services is largely built on blockchain technology, a decentralized digital ledger that records transactions securely without needing a middleman like a bank. This “decentralized finance” (or DeFi) is at the heart of the crypto movement.

The Trump administration has actively worked to legitimize it. With the Genius Act, it recently secured passage of a law for stablecoins (a type of crypto pegged to a stable asset, like the U.S. dollar, to reduce volatility) and even announced the creation of a U.S. crypto reserve.

This regulatory embrace, which also includes his family’s growing crypto empire, has fueled a market rally. Bitcoin is currently trading, according to data firm CoinGecko, over $105,000, and the total value of the crypto market is nearly $3.4 trillion, a colossal recovery from the “crypto winter” of recent years, which saw the spectacular collapse of exchanges like FTX.

For an industry that has weathered fierce debate and volatility, Trump’s public anointment is a powerful, if revisionist, seal of approval. The man who once saw crypto as an enemy of the dollar now sees it as a patriotic legacy that he personally built.