On Wednesday, Democratic representative Ro Khanna from California hosted a crypto roundtable at the Willard Hotel in Washington, D.C., with attendees like Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, Shark Tank businessman Mark Cuban, Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse, and Coinbase’s Chief Legal Officer Paul Grewal, along with a senior assistant to President Biden.

Coinbase’s Grewal applauded the Biden team’s effort to engage with crypto industry stakeholders and learn about the challenges they were encountering. The Coinbase representative also expressed optimism that the Biden camp would continue to conduct substantive outreach to the digital asset industry. “It was largely a listen-and-learn dynamic,” Grewal said. “Ms. Dunn took over an hour of her time to sit with 30 or 40 of us and patiently listened, asked questions and expressed real commitment to continuing this dialogue as opposed to just thanking us for our time and sending us out the door.”

The Biden administration’s openness toward the industry was echoed by CEO of the Crypto Council for Innovation, Sheila Warren: “She [Anita Dunn] was very engaged, actively notetaking, all of that kind of stuff. For a government official at that level to be that engaged for over an hour … that is pretty amazing and unusual.”

However, Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse pointed out that the Democratic Party largely showed a marked hostility toward the nascent industry, threatening its survival. “Unfortunately, the majority of Dems continue to enable Gensler’s unlawful war on crypto – sabotaging the ability for American innovation to thrive,” Garlinghouse said. “It’s no wonder the GOP has announced a pro-crypto stance. Gensler will go down as the Luddite of his time. Words are easy, action is hard but necessary. Choose wisely. Voters are paying attention.”

Biden’s outreach comes just as former president Donald Trump announced his upcoming attendance at the annual Bitcoin Conference, held in Nashville, Tennessee this year.