Governor Gavin Newsom Mentions Bitcoin in COVID-19 Speech But Not in Good Light

California Governor, Gavin Newsom, has become the latest government official to mention Bitcoin in a public address, joining the likes of President Donald Trump, and U.S Treasury Secretary, Steve Mnuchin.

But, as one would expect from a government official, it wasn’t good publicity for the cryptocurrency, as it was described as a tool used by cybercriminals to receive payments from their victims via scams and email phishing attempts.

The Governor’s mention of Bitcoin came as part of his official announcement on Wednesday regarding the outbreak of the novel coronavirus, Covid-19, where he highlighted measures currently being put in place to curtail the spread of the pandemic in the state.

Governor Gavin Newsom just mentioned bitcoin during his COVID-19 announcement. pic.twitter.com/Z6TsnfT6XY

— Vis (@Vis_in_numeris) March 25, 2020

Regarding those measures, Governor Newsom said the state and its citizens want to make sure it is not being taken advantage of as there are extraordinary people and those who do extraordinarily bad things.

In specifying one example of questionable activity, Governor Newsom added:

“That doesn’t just include interface with government, but people claiming that we need to send the equivalent of bitcoin in advance to get some materials before they can send them over.”

Although some may argue that the Governor’s negative bitcoin shoutout isn’t good for the cryptocurrency, the mention does highlight the fact that Bitcoin is entering mainstream consciousness.

No ASL Sign for Bitcoin

The speech also revealed an interesting fact pointed out by BullBitcoin CEO, Francis Pouliot on Twitter. There is no American Sign Language (ASL) sign for Bitcoin, with the seemingly confused ASL translator during the Governor’s speech having to fingerspell B-I-T-C-O-I-N.

Wait a minute there is no ASL sign for Bitcoin?? https://t.co/l7gf2kValO

— Francis Pouliot ☣️ (@francispouliot_) March 25, 2020

With Bitcoin lexicons such as Satoshi already making a debut in the Oxford English Dictionary, there could not be a better time for the leading cryptocurrency to get its official sign in ASL.