Judge Rules Tornado Cash Can’t Be Sanctioned Again
The Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Asset Control (OFAC) has removed Tornado Cash from its sanctions list in March, after an appeals court found that the agency had “overstepped its authority” by sanctioning the service’s smart contracts in 2022.
However, the way OFAC de-listed Tornado Cash, along with the notices and motions it filed in court in March, suggests that the agency might still reinstate the mixing service on its sanctions list, according to a federal judge. Treasury lawyers argued that since OFAC lifted the sanctions prior to the district court’s final ruling (following the appeals court decision), the issue was moot.
For the six plaintiffs in Van Loon vs. Treasury—all Tornado Cash users—the matter was far from moot. In an April 21 filing, their lawyers criticized OFAC’s response to the Fifth Circuit’s ruling, labeling it “a study in chaos” and accusing them of using mootness as a tactic to “evade an adverse judgment.”
