Picture this: You’re a wealthy tech executive trying to keep pace with the Trump administration and its mercurial, authoritarian leader. You notice a firm tied to the president’s son marketing an artificial intelligence conference with “U.S. Treasury” in the title, where, it claims, the U.S. treasury secretary will unveil the government’s artificial intelligence policy. So you pay to sponsor the event, or you buy your ticket, thinking it’s a chance to hobnob with government bigwigs — and then you find out that this isn’t a “treasury” conference at all, and the treasury secretary might not even show up.
That is the heartbreaking scenario in which some tech executives found themselves in after 1789 Capital, an investment firm that counts Donald Trump Jr. among its board members, reportedly promoted — and later altered — an upcoming event it once said would feature Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent sharing AI policy.
As The Wall Street Journal reported:
An investment fund run by prominent Trump supporters pitched companies on sponsoring a conference it called the ‘Inaugural U.S. Treasury A.I. Summit,’ during which it said Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent would unveil the Treasury Department’s artificial-intelligence strategy. The fund, called 1789 Capital, circulated the pitch to technology companies in recent weeks, calling the Oct. 21 event ‘historic,’ according to an email to potential donors and the pitch itself, a copy of which was reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. ... After the Journal inquired about the event, the conference organizers released some details about it—including a different name for it, ‘AI Summit on American Prosperity,’ that no longer included the word ‘Treasury.’ People familiar with the event said it had been pitched differently in different venues.
Although Donald Trump Jr. sits on the investment firm’s board, sources told the Journal that he “isn’t involved in the event.” And yet, adding to the coziness of it all, a cofounder of 1789 Capital also cofounded the Prometheus Initiative, an organization that’s hosting this event:
The group hosting the conference was created in part by a donor to Vice President JD Vance, Christopher Buskirk, who is also a founder of the 1789 fund, according to people familiar with the matter.
Buskirk didn’t respond to the Journal’s request for comment, and as for the Trump administration, it seems they’re trying to downplay any appearance of impropriety. A Treasury Department spokesperson originally told the Journal the secretary would attend because he’s “focused on the economics of AI and ensuring that it will work for American businesses and workers,” which was followed up by another spokesperson who said Bessent may skip the event if the government is still shut down.
Nonetheless, so continues the string of conflict of interest concerns emerging from 1789 Capital and its ties to the Trump family. For more on that, I highly recommend this column from my colleague Zeeshan Aleem.