Sam “SBF” Bankman-Fried, the convicted founder of FTX, posted on Twitter (now X) today from inside the Manhattan Detention Center, breaking months of silence with a long-winded take on layoffs, job cuts, and unemployment.
“I have a lot of sympathy for gov’t employees: I, too, have not checked my email for the past few (hundred) days. And I can confirm that being unemployed is a lot less relaxing than it looks,” Sam wrote.
Cryptopolitan immediately recognized the subtext. He wasn’t just talking about jobs, he was aligning himself with Donald Trump’s administration and its decision to fire thousands of federal workers. His comments came days after Trump’s White House ramped up its layoffs, targeting government agencies, defense employees, and research departments.
1) I have a lot of sympathy for gov’t employees: I, too, have not checked my email for the past few (hundred) days
And I can confirm that being unemployed is a lot less relaxing than it looks
— SBF (@SBF_FTX) February 25, 2025
SBF draws outrage online
Crypto Twitter exploded within minutes of SBF’s post. Questions flooded in—How did he get access to Twitter? Was he using a smuggled phone? Did someone post on his behalf?
“How did this guy get a phone?” one user asked. Another wrote, “You stole billions of dollars from people, nobody cares at all what you have to say.”
SBF’s post turned into a defense of terminations, saying that it’s not always about poor performance but bad management, job misalignment, or lack of resources. He even compared it to competitors who hired 30,000 too many employees and let them sit around doing nothing all day.
“And we saw it internally, when a manager would get busy or distracted, and half of a department would lose its bearing at the same time,” said Sam. “It isn’t the employee’s fault, when that happens. It isn’t their fault if their employer doesn’t really know what to do with them, or doesn’t really have anyone to effectively manage them. It isn’t their fault if internal politics lead their department to lose its way.”
The layoffs Sam referenced in his Twitter post are part of Trump’s ongoing workforce purge, which has already eliminated thousands of federal jobs.
The Department of Veterans Affairs dismissed more than 1,000 employees on February 13, including researchers working on cancer treatment, opioid addiction, and prosthetics.
Government data from March 2024 shows that 220,000 federal employees had less than a year on the job, making them prime targets for mass layoffs.
The Department of Defense announced a 5,400-person reduction, with plans to cut up to 8% of its civilian workforce. The Pentagon has frozen hiring, while military personnel remain exempt from the cuts.
SBF has his first prison interview
Just four days ago, Sam sat down for his first interview from prison, where he accused Biden’s Department of Justice (DOJ) of targeting him and all but hinted at changing his political loyalty to Trump.
“Trump had a lot of frustrations with Kaplan,” said SBF, referring to Judge Lewis Kaplan, the man who sentenced him to 25 years in prison. “I certainly did as well.”
He blamed the DOJ for allegedly manipulating his case, accusing them of telling the jury that FTX customers lost everything while barring his team from arguing the opposite.
“The jury was told something that was just not true, and Kaplan blocked us from correcting it,” Sam said.
He also took a jab at Danielle Sassoon, the lead prosecutor in his case. She recently resigned instead of dismissing a corruption case involving NYC Mayor Eric Adams. He suggested that her resignation raised questions about her role in his trial.
“My prosecutor has been in the news recently for tussles with Trump’s DOJ,” Sam said.
He then claimed that his donations to Republicans were hidden, while his Democratic contributions were widely publicized.
“There was a lot of explicit politicization going on,” Sam said. “Threats were made. A Republican congressional candidate was told his wife would be indicted if he didn’t play along with Biden’s DOJ.”
Cryptopolitan Academy: Want to grow your money in 2025? Learn how to do it with DeFi in our upcoming webclass. Save Your Spot
