The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York filed a court response on March 11 urging a federal judge to reject Sam Bankman-Fried’s pro se motion for a new trial, dismantling each of his arguments and characterizing his claims of political persecution as fanciful given his history as a major donor across political cycles.
What SBF Argued and Why Prosecutors Say It Fails
Bankman-Fried filed the motion in February 2026 from prison, representing himself without an attorney. According to recent report by The Block, the motion centers on two former FTX executives, Daniel Chapsky and Ryan Salame, whose statements SBF argues constitute newly discovered evidence that would support his case. Prosecutors countered that both individuals were known to the defense well before the 2023 trial. The legal standard for newly discovered evidence requires that the evidence was genuinely unavailable at the time of trial. Witnesses the defense chose not to call do not meet that standard regardless of what they say now.
The solvency argument received the sharpest dismissal. SBF has maintained that new testimony would demonstrate FTX was solvent and that customers were eventually made whole through the bankruptcy process. Prosecutors called this factually wrong and legally irrelevant in the same sentence. The legal irrelevance is the more important point. Criminal fraud under federal law is complete at the moment of misappropriation. What happens to the money afterward, including whether victims are eventually repaid, does not retroactively eliminate the crime. The FTX bankruptcy estate returning funds to creditors is a civil outcome that has no bearing on whether Bankman-Fried committed fraud when he directed customer funds to Alameda Research.
The overwhelming evidence standard is the third line of prosecution argument. Even if a court were to admit the new testimony, the government maintains the trial outcome would be unchanged. The evidence that SBF directed billions in customer funds to Alameda Research included testimony from his closest collaborators, internal communications, and financial records. A new trial featuring two additional witnesses arguing solvency would face that existing evidentiary record.
The Political Persecution Claim
The lawfare argument is the most politically charged element of SBF’s filing and received the most pointed response. Bankman-Fried has suggested his prosecution was politically motivated, a claim that has circulated in some crypto communities alongside broader narratives about the previous administration targeting crypto figures. Prosecutors noted that SBF was a significant political donor across multiple cycles and to candidates of both parties, making the targeted political persecution framing difficult to sustain factually.
The pardon pathway has also effectively closed. The Trump administration indicated in early 2026 that it has no plans to grant Bankman-Fried clemency, a decision that sits alongside the administration’s separate crypto-friendly regulatory posture. Being broadly supportive of the crypto industry and declining to pardon a convicted fraudster are not contradictory positions.
Two Separate Legal Tracks
The pro se retrial motion is procedurally distinct from the formal Second Circuit appeal that SBF’s attorneys are pursuing through proper appellate channels. The Second Circuit appeal focuses on alleged procedural errors by the trial judge rather than newly discovered evidence, and represents the more legally substantive challenge to the conviction. The retrial motion filed directly by SBF is generally viewed by legal observers as having limited prospects given the standard of proof required.
Bankman-Fried is currently serving a 25-year sentence. The Roman Storm retrial covered in this publication earlier this week, where the DOJ is seeking to retry Tornado Cash’s co-founder on charges carrying a 40-year maximum, represents the prosecution side of crypto’s ongoing legal landscape. SBF’s retrial request represents the defense side of the same era’s most significant crypto fraud prosecution. Neither is moving quickly toward resolution.
