Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump proposed a "strategic national Bitcoin reserve" to a crowd of onlookers at the 2024 Bitcoin Conference in Nashville on Saturday, a mismatched meeting of worlds in which both Trump and the audience seemed confused about his attendance — at least, until he promised to remove a deeply-despised federal regulator.

"We’re gonna keep their hands off Bitcoin, they’re gonna keep their hands off crypto, we’re gonna let it grow," Trump said rotely, after reviving his "Pocahontas" insult toward Sen. Elizabeth Warren. "On day one, I will fire Gary Gensler and appoint a new SEC chairman," he added, perking up when the crowd erupted with cheers. "Wow, I didn’t know he was that unpopular! Let me say it again: On day one, I will fire Gary Gensler. Whoa!"

As chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission, Gensler has made himself the enemy of the cryptocurrency world, largely for his insistence that crypto tokens are securities that should be regulated by the SEC, stepping up enforcement on companies and projects it says are dealing in unregistered securities.

Doing away with regulators and the rules they espouse foundational to Trump’s politics — a glance at his Agenda47 policy platform proves as much — and talk of pulling out the regulatory thorn in the collective sides of crypto enthusiasts was music to their ears.

But it was, as previously noted, the source of the only major response Trump drew, even as he attempted to anoint himself as "the first American president to address a Bitcoin event anywhere in the world."

Bitcoin, Trump said, is the "steel industry of 100 years ago," just in its infancy. Though his grasp of cryptocurrency seemed a bit loose.

"In just 15 years, Bitcoin has gone from merely an idea posted anonymously on an internet message board to being the ninth-most valuable asset anywhere in the world," Trump said, before pulling up. "Can you believe that? Is that right? That’s a big deal!"

But it only took him a few minutes into his speech to begin his attack on political opponents. “The people in this room are high-IQ individuals. I’m running against a low-IQ individual. I’m not even talking about him!” he referring to likely Democratic presidential opponent Kamala Harris, then President Joe Biden. 

Trump, by his own admission, went to the 2024 Bitcoin Conference — the "world’s largest gathering of bitcoiners" — to encourage Bitcoin as part of his "America First" platform, "because if we don’t do it, China is going to be doing this…let’s do it and do it right."

His 50 minute address, which headlined the conference, was freewheeling in his usual manner — at one point, he said the U.S. would create so much electricity that "they’ll be begging me, no more electricity sir, we have enough." But, unlike his rallies, the crowd didn’t overwhelmingly embrace his typical attacks on electric cars, his insistence that Democrats rigged the 2020 election, or his attacks on Biden or Harris — who he said is "against crypto, by the way, she’s against it very big," a statement that has no basis in fact. Harris, who has maintained respectful relations with major tech firms, has largely avoided stances on cryptocurrency.

Trump, however, pledged to never create a central bank of digital currency, to establish a framework around stable coins, and to establish a "strategic national Bitcoin stockpile" to build wealth off of Bitcoin seized by federal agents — which Trump seemed to criticize, even as he said it.

“As you know, most of the Bitcoin currently held by the United States government was obtained through law enforcement action — you know that they took it from you. Let’s take that guy’s life. Let’s take his family. His house is Bitcoin. We’ll turn it into Bitcoin. It’s been taken away from you, because that’s where we’re going,” Trump said. “Now. That’s where this country is going, to fascist regime,” he said, before promising to “transform that vast wealth into a permanent national asset.”

Cryptocurrency, he said, will be used to fund the American dream that so many in the audience are experiencing — though he sounded a dark, somewhat confusing, warning amid that optimism.

“A lot of you people are in the American dream, but you’re going to be crushed. If you don’t elect me, I hate to tell you, you don’t elect me, you’re gonna be crushed. You’re gonna say, Alice, what a mistake it was,” Trump said. “We went for a person who has no talent. She has been a failure at almost everything she’s done instead of Trump. And look at us now. We’re going to move into an extremely small house from our beautiful house.”

As he signed off, headed to his second rally of the day in Minnesota, where he is expected to stand beside his running mate, JD Vance, Trump offered a warm send-off to the crowd.

"Thank you all," he said. "Have a good time with your Bitcoin and your crypto and everything else that you're playing with."