Justin Sun, the founder of Tron, has filed a lawsuit against World Liberty Financial, a cryptocurrency firm with ties to the Trump family, alleging that the company froze his $WLFI tokens and made fraudulent representations. The lawsuit claims that World Liberty's leadership engaged in an illegal scheme to seize Sun's tokens, which he purchased after being solicited by the company in 2024.
Sun invested $45 million in $WLFI tokens, reportedly due to the project's claims of promoting decentralized finance and its association with the Trump family. However, when Sun refused to continue investing in 2025, World Liberty's principals allegedly became hostile towards him. The lawsuit alleges that World Liberty made fraudulent misrepresentations about the rights of token holders and the governance of the $WLFI tokens. It also claims that the company changed the smart contract governing $WLFI in August 2025 to add a 'blacklisting' function, allowing it to freeze tokens in specific wallets without disclosing this to investors.
The complaint argues that this modification was used to freeze Sun's tokens, pressuring him to mint $200 million of World Liberty's USD1 stablecoin and manipulating the market price of $WLFI tokens. The lawsuit raises regulatory questions, suggesting that World Liberty's ability to issue, freeze, and reassign tokens may qualify it as a money transmitter under US law.
Other allegations include threats made by World Liberty's co-founder, Chase Herro, to burn Sun's $WLFI tokens and report him to US authorities. Sun has stated that he tried to resolve the situation in good faith and wants to be treated the same as other early investors who received tokens.