Justin Sun emerged as a savior for World Liberty Financial (WLFI) in late 2024, injecting enough capital for the Trump family's nascent crypto project to survive. A few months later, he was also the most notable guest at the president's first exclusive meme coin gala. Now, the relationship has collapsed.
The Chinese-born crypto billionaire accuses the WLFI team of freezing his tokens and stripping him of voting rights, and he has taken the dispute to a federal court. The man who was once Trump's biggest crypto supporter is now the most prominent accuser.
A significant absence at the gala.
This year's TRUMP meme coin gala took place – but without Justin Sun. Twelve months earlier, he was the biggest name.
Sun's name topped the official poster rankings. By the end of the evening, he walked away with a gold watch and shared the entire event on social media.
But this year, his absence replaced Sun's presence in a lawsuit against WLFI.
Sun filed a lawsuit in a federal court in San Francisco, alleging that the Trump-supported crypto project operates an illegal system to seize his tokens, strip him of his governance rights, and ultimately erase his holdings entirely through a process known as 'burning.' The allegations include breach of contract, fraud, and abuse.
The Trump family's project has retaliated, calling the accusations baseless and accusing Sun of playing the victim to cover up his own behavior.
WLFI co-founder Eric Trump compared the lawsuit to paying millions for a banana taped to a wall, throwing shade at one of Sun's more eccentric purchases.
Beyond the details of the lawsuit, the conflict showcases a public breakdown in one of the crypto world’s most striking political alliances.
Before it all went wrong.
When Trump announced WLFI in September 2024, the project struggled to gain traction from the outset.
The token sale launched in October with an ambitious goal of 300 million dollars, but the non-transferable tokens, available only to a few investors, garnered little interest and even less capital.
Then Sun stepped in and confirmed that he had purchased tokens for 30 million dollars. That amount lifted the project above the revenue threshold where Trump's company began to turn a profit.
The founder of TRON was soon appointed as an advisor for the project.
"The USA is becoming the center of blockchain, and Bitcoin owes that to Donald Trump," he wrote on X at the time. "TRON is committed to making America great again."
Sun's investments didn't stop there. In January 2025, he invested another 45 million dollars, bringing his total stake in WLFI up to 75 million dollars.
For a time, the alliance resembled a genuine community of interest. Sun gained access to the strongest political name in the crypto world. At the same time, Trump got an investor just when they needed it most.
The relationship between Sun and Trump visibly culminated last May when 220 of the largest holders of the president's personal TRUMP meme coin gathered for a black-tie dinner at USA president Donald Trump's golf club in Virginia.
Sun not only attended but was the star of the evening. His name topped the official leaderboard displayed at the event, showcasing the largest single investment among attendees.
A few weeks later, he promised to invest an additional 100 million dollars in the TRUMP meme coin, asserting that "TRUMP and TRON are the future of crypto."
Alongside the festivities, a federal fraud case against Sun was slowly approaching a resolution.
The investigation lost its momentum.
In 2023, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) accused Sun of executing hundreds of thousands of fake trades to artificially inflate the price of a cryptocurrency on his platform and make nearly 32 million dollars in profit.
The authorities also alleged that he paid celebrities to promote the token while pretending it was genuine endorsements.
The case was put on hold a few weeks after Trump's inauguration, after Sun and the SEC's lawyers jointly asked the judge to pause the case while they negotiated a settlement.
Last month, the parties agreed to a settlement. Sun paid a fine of 10 million dollars – a fraction of the nearly 32 million dollars he allegedly earned.
The timing raised eyebrows. Senator Elizabeth Warren was blunt in her assessment.
"Justin Sun poured 90 million dollars into Trump's crypto projects, and today the SEC chose to drop the case against him," she said. "The SEC shouldn't be a lapdog for Trump's billionaire friends."
The deal seemed to embody everything the Sun-Trump relationship had promised. What followed was the complete opposite.
The relationship ends in court.
Sun's lawsuit against WLFI didn't come completely out of the blue. Last September, WLFI quietly blacklisted Sun's wallet and presented the action as a routine security measure.
Earlier this month, tensions escalated when Sun publicly accused WLFI of inserting a 'backdoor to blacklisting,' allowing them to freeze, restrict, or seize any tokenholder's holdings.
WLFI's response was to challenge him to take the case to court. Sun did just that.
But the most revealing part of Sun's lawsuit was who he directed the accusations at. Instead of Trump, he accused 'certain individuals' from the WLFI team, pinpointing co-founder Chase Herro.
He maintained that the president himself would never have accepted what transpired.
"All I want is to be treated like every other early investor," he wrote.
Even during an open lawsuit against the Trump family's project, Sun couldn't bring himself to sue the man at the helm.
Whether that restraint was genuine or a strategy is now a question for a federal court – along with the larger issue of what the Sun-Trump relationship was really built on.