During the Senate Banking Committee's March 27 nomination hearing, US Senator John Kennedy questioned potential SEC chairman Paul Atkins about the possibility of a pardon for Sam "SBF" Bankman-Fried. Kennedy focused on donations made by Bankman-Fried's family to Stanford University and urged the SEC to prevent any potential pardons for SBF. Kennedy emphasized the importance of equal standards of law and punishment in America and vowed to closely monitor the actions of the SEC. Reports surfaced in January about SBF's parents seeking a pardon for their son from President Donald Trump, but experts believe a pardon for SBF is unlikely due to differences in his case compared to that of Silk Road founder Ross Ulbricht.