Sep 29, 2026 · 39 min · 10 segments
On both the left and the right, in politics and in other forms of public life, the American public seems to have forgotten a simple idea - it's a terrible idea to associate yourself with scumbags. In…
Earlier this month, there was an interesting announcement made by a group called ManaFund.
ManaFund is an effective altruist funding platform that tries to direct funding to good causes.
And they announced that they had hired convicted fraudster Caroline Ellison.
Now, if you're not familiar with Ellison's name, Ellison is the former CEO of Alameda Research.
This is a sister company of the disgraced crypto company FTX, which was founded by Sam Bankman Freed.
And FTX infamously went down in a pile of criminality and accounting fraud and stolen funds.
Now, reporting suggests that Caroline Ellison was fully aware of the fraud that was being perpetrated that precipitated the company's multi-billion dollar implosion.
Two counts of wire fraud, two counts of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, conspiracy to commit commodities fraud, conspiracy to commit securities fraud, conspiracy to commit money laundering.
And what I find interesting is the company didn't just hire her for any old role.
They hired her for a role that involves the allocation of philanthropic money.
She's directly within their funding organization, which seems like a bad idea for someone who's been convicted of fraud, of financial fraud.
Making matters even worse, Austin Chin explicitly noted that he felt a keen debt towards the FTX Future Fund, which gives the entire thing here the appearance of a quid pro quo.
This whole story ended up setting off a firestorm in effective altruist circles, and the decision was savaged by most people.
Earlier this month, there was an interesting announcement made by a group called ManaFund.
ManaFund is an effective altruist funding platform that tries to direct funding to good causes.
And they announced that they had hired convicted fraudster Caroline Ellison.
Now, if you're not familiar with Ellison's name, Ellison is the former CEO of Alameda Research.
This is a sister company of the disgraced crypto company FTX, which was founded by Sam Bankman Freed.
And FTX infamously went down in a pile of criminality and accounting fraud and stolen funds.
Now, reporting suggests that Caroline Ellison was fully aware of the fraud that was being perpetrated that precipitated the company's multi-billion dollar implosion.
Two counts of wire fraud, two counts of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, conspiracy to commit commodities fraud, conspiracy to commit securities fraud, conspiracy to commit money laundering.
And what I find interesting is the company didn't just hire her for any old role.
They hired her for a role that involves the allocation of philanthropic money.
She's directly within their funding organization, which seems like a bad idea for someone who's been convicted of fraud, of financial fraud.
Making matters even worse, Austin Chin explicitly noted that he felt a keen debt towards the FTX Future Fund, which gives the entire thing here the appearance of a quid pro quo.
This whole story ended up setting off a firestorm in effective altruist circles, and the decision was savaged by most people.
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