U.S. President Donald Trump said he knows "nothing" about World Liberty Financial, the crypto venture co-owned by his family, when questioned about the firm's UAE-linked investors in an interview following last week's midterm elections.

Asked by columnist Ross Douthat why his co-ownership of a company partly owned by investors tied to the United Arab Emirates government differs from arrangements he would label corrupt if they involved the Biden family, Trump replied: "Here's the difference [...] I'm gonna tell you why. Because I know nothing about it," according to a transcript published by CBS News.

Pressed on why he has not simply divested, Trump said most of his money is managed by Wall Street firms through index funds and that his sons run the family business. "It's hard to say to them, 'Don't do anything anymore for four years because I'm president,'" he said.

When Douthat asked whether foreign investors in the company believe they are buying influence, Trump said: "I don't know." He argued that conflicts of interest have dogged presidents "going back to George Washington," adding that past presidents "own something, whatever crypto was at the time."

"There's crypto, and before that there was oil," Trump said, adding that "every president has had this problem."

"I'm a bigger name than other presidents, whether we like it or not," he said.

The exchange cuts to the core of the criticism Democrats have leveled at the venture: a sitting president's family business drawing large investment from entities tied to a foreign government while he holds office. His answer — that he is unaware of arrangements his family and business partners manage — frames the questions now playing out across congressional scrutiny and a federal court fight.

World Liberty's UAE ties

World Liberty Financial, which Eric Trump announced in August 2024, issues the WLFI governance token and the USD1 stablecoin — two core building blocks of decentralized finance (DeFi), where governance tokens give holders a voice in a protocol's development and stablecoins are designed to hold a steady value against traditional currencies. In January, it launched World Liberty Markets, a lending and borrowing platform built on the DeFi protocol Dolomite.

The venture's UAE connections have drawn scrutiny from Democrats. Aryam Investment, a UAE-backed entity tied to the country's national security adviser, Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed, agreed to buy a 49% stake in World Liberty Financial for $500 million four days before Trump's January 2025 inauguration, as Decrypt reported in February, citing The Wall Street Journal. The deal, signed by Eric Trump on World Liberty's behalf, reportedly preceded the administration's reversal of restrictions on advanced AI chip sales to the UAE. For the lawmakers raising concerns, that sequence — a large foreign government-linked stake on the eve of the inauguration, followed by a policy reversal favoring the investor's home country — is the crux of the matter.

A World Liberty spokesperson said at the time that neither Trump nor his Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, had "any involvement whatsoever" in the transaction, ABC News reported. Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) described the arrangement in February as "potentially criminal conduct." Trump has previously said he was not aware of the deal.

The company's UAE ties have also surfaced in its legal battle with Tron founder Justin Sun. Sun's lawyers asked a federal court to sanction World Liberty, alleging the firm delayed disclosing UAE ownership that could defeat federal jurisdiction over his lawsuit. World Liberty has called Sun's legal campaign a "meritless PR stunt." A ruling on that sanction request is the most concrete near-term development to watch in the dispute, since it would turn squarely on what the firm disclosed about its UAE ownership, and when.

Trump family stake

The Trump family's financial stake in the venture is set out in World Liberty's own disclosures. DT Marks DEFI LLC, an entity affiliated with Trump and certain family members, owns about 38% of the holding company behind World Liberty Financial, holds 22.5 billion WLFI tokens, and is entitled to 75% of the net proceeds from WLFI token sales, according to the company. A separate Trump-affiliated entity has an indirect claim on interest earned on the reserves backing USD1. Set against that disclosure, the president's "I know nothing" answer marks the fault line of the debate: the venture's own documents describe extensive family-level financial exposure even as Trump describes no personal knowledge of its workings.

The disclosures state that no member of the Trump family is an officer, director, or employee of World Liberty, though Trump's sons have remained involved with the company, as Decrypt reported earlier this year.