Tether faces US Senate scrutiny over multimillion-dollar payments to a consulting firm co-owned by a former White House crypto adviser.
On Oct. 22, Senator Richard Blumenthal, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, demanded records on the stablecoin issuer’s reported payments to Nxum, a consulting firm co-founded by Bo Hines, who helped develop the Trump administration’s cryptocurrency policies.
The inquiry follows reports that Tether sent more than $6 million to Nxum while Hines retained an ownership stake in the business and worked on legislation affecting the company’s operations. Hines subsequently left the White House and became chief executive of Tether’s US stablecoin business.
In his letter to Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino, Blumenthal wrote:
Tether’s alleged multimillion-dollar payment to a firm controlled by the White House official primarily responsible for cryptocurrency policy implicates federal ethics, anticorruption, and lobbying laws.
Payments raise questions over Tether’s influence on stablecoin legislation
The controversy centers on the GENIUS Act, which President Donald Trump signed into law in July 2025 to establish a federal regulatory framework for dollar-backed stablecoins.
According to Blumenthal’s letter, which cited The Wall Street Journal, Tether agreed in May 2025 to pay Nxum $415,000 per month for strategic lobbying, public relations, and other advisory services.
At the time, Hines served as executive director of the White House’s digital asset advisory council and retained a one-third ownership interest in Nxum.
The senator alleged that Hines joined discussions about the legislation while his business partners coordinated lobbying with Tether executives.
Blumenthal also accused Hines of advocating changes to the GENIUS Act that would particularly benefit Tether, including provisions allowing foreign stablecoin issuers additional time to meet US regulatory requirements.
Those accommodations carried considerable commercial significance for Tether because its flagship USDT stablecoin operates through an offshore issuance structure.
The legislation created pathways for qualifying foreign issuers to serve US customers under specified regulatory conditions. It also provided a transition period before stricter restrictions on distributing foreign-issued stablecoins would apply.
According to the senator, Tether initially routed cryptocurrency payments through Notorious, a marketing company headed by Peter Vincer, rather than contracting directly with Nxum.
The money was subsequently transferred to Nxum and distributed through additional transactions. Tether reportedly began contracting directly with the consulting firm after Hines left government service in August 2025.
Blumenthal also cited allegations that Nxum later offered Vincer more than $300,000 and a share of future payments in exchange for signing a nondisclosure agreement.
The senator has requested transaction records, associated cryptocurrency wallet addresses, and communications to establish the purpose of the intermediary arrangement and identify the parties that ultimately received the funds.
Blumenthal’s inquiry has not established that Tether or Hines violated federal law, and the subcommittee’s Democratic minority issued the requests.
His letter referenced claims that Tether considered buying a 25% ownership stake in Nxum for $56 million and asked the company to disclose whether it discussed or negotiated such an investment.
Tether’s US expansion faces fresh political scrutiny
The investigation comes as Tether pursues a domestic expansion strategy built around the same regulatory framework Hines helped develop.
In September 2025, the company named Hines head of its US stablecoin initiative, putting the former government adviser in charge of a business positioned to compete in America’s regulated digital-dollar market.
Tether subsequently launched USA₮ in January 2026, with Anchorage Digital Bank serving as the token’s federally regulated issuer and Cantor Fitzgerald acting as reserve custodian and preferred primary dealer.
The arrangement gives Tether a domestic stablecoin offering alongside its much larger offshore USDT business, which must navigate separate requirements governing foreign issuers and access to US customers.
Those requirements are approaching implementation. On Oct. 21, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) finalized regulations governing payment stablecoin issuers, including certain foreign companies operating under the GENIUS Act.
The rules take effect on Jan. 18, 2027, introducing federal requirements covering reserves, redemption, risk management, supervision, and issuer registration.