Two of the Senate's most prominent progressives escalated their assault on the Trump administration's crypto agenda Monday, demanding the Labor Department kill a pending rule that would open America's $10 trillion retirement market to Bitcoin and other digital assets — and calling it a direct wealth transfer to the president and his family.
Senators Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), joined by Rep. Bobby Scott (D-VA), sent a 14-page letter on June 2, 2026, to Acting Labor Secretary Keith Sonderling. The letter asks the department to withdraw a rule proposed in March that would give fiduciaries broad cover to include volatile assets — crypto, private equity, private credit — in 401(k) plans, as long as they document that they weighed the relevant factors before offering access.
The senators argue the rule inverts the legal standard that has governed retirement plans for half a century. Rather than requiring fiduciaries to demonstrate prudence, it would presume prudence so long as paperwork exists — a reversal, they contend, of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 and multiple Supreme Court rulings. "The proposed rule is harmful to American workers and counter to statute, Congressional intent, existing regulations, and case law," the letter states.
The conflict-of-interest argument is the sharpest edge of the letter. Sanders, Warren, and Scott name specific Trump family products: World Liberty Financial's WLFI governance token and USD1 stablecoin, and the official Trump meme coin issued on Solana. The letter argues that weakening retirement fiduciary standards would funnel new institutional capital toward those instruments at the direct expense of savers. "The change to the prudence standard described above expands opportunities for President Trump and his family to profit at the expense of taxpayers, workers and retirees," the letter reads.
The Trump administration set this process in motion in August 2025, when the president signed an executive order directing the Labor Department to reevaluate its approach to alternative assets in retirement plans. The March 2026 rule proposal followed from that directive.
Analysts cited by Decrypt have estimated that routing even a small share of retirement savings toward crypto could inject hundreds of billions of dollars into the digital asset sector — a figure that explains both the industry's enthusiasm for the rule and the senators' alarm at its scope.
A Labor Department spokesperson told Decrypt it had received the letter and was reviewing it.
What's at stake. If the rule survives, fiduciaries could begin offering Bitcoin and other digital assets across 401(k) plans with reduced legal exposure. Industry proponents say that widens investor choice and brings retirement savings into an asset class with institutional-grade infrastructure. If the rule is withdrawn or blocked, the $10 trillion retirement market stays largely closed to crypto, and the administration's most significant domestic crypto policy initiative collapses before taking effect. Given the explicit conflict-of-interest framing from two senior senators, the letter is also a predicate for oversight hearings — and potential litigation — if the Labor Department presses forward.