It is disappointing to me that people can look at the list of infamous people he has already pardoned, who have paid him, and then expect that he won't continue acting on trend, just because some shallow-book manipulable prediction market, which is primarily a money laundering tool for event fixers, tells us that it's "not likely".
I think that because of my own judgment, not because the market told me. Also, it seems unlikely that someone would burn money to manipulate this market as there's nothing to gain from it.
By the way, Trump literally said he won't pardon SBF[0]. It seems money is not the only factor he considers when handing out pardons.
Wha backlash? Trump pardoned a Honduran ex-president convicted of smuggling tons of drugs, right in the midst of using the military to bomb boats for unproven drug smuggling, and kidnapped Maduro presumably because of drugs too (or was it oil?). Zero repercussions except for futile anger from internet weirdos like me.
This administration seems to relish getting away with things that would destroy any other presidency.
The backlash was relatively mild because few of his supporters personally see themselves as victims of the Honduran ex-president. That's very different from SBF—almost everyone who invested in crypto at the time hates him, not to mention the actual FTX customers.
Everybody hates Trump, he's the least popular president ever.
Unless these crypto folks have massive money and are using it right now to pay Trump tk not pardon SBF, what would they do? What backlash could crypto do? It's not like he can unpardon Trump. Crypto just joins the long line of people who fell for it again and nothing happens.
What, is a Republican going to vote against Trump? Hah! Impeachment? What trouble could crypto cause for Trump? Even if they could cause trouble, Trump would just make up charges and send the DOJ after crypto.
Like most people, he probably understands the value of keeping a few friends and allies close, even if it's purely self-interest. At Trump's scale, some relationships are worth billions, so a bribe of a few million can be a poor trade-off if it risks burning a high-value relationship.