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- Recently, Ripple and the SEC jointly submitted a request to the U.S. District Court to lift the injunction.
- Attorney John E. Deaton posted on X that there’s a 70% chance Judge Analisa Torres will approve the request.
The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) lawsuit against Ripple Labs, filed way back in December 2020, claims that XRP was sold as an unregistered security, and has been one of the longest and most watched sagas in crypto. Now, XRP holders may finally have a reason to feel hopeful. Prominent attorney John Deaton recently gave his take on the case, saying there’s a 70% chance Judge Torres will grant Ripple the relief it’s seeking.
CNF reported that Ripple and the SEC submitted a joint request to the U.S. District Court, asking Judge Torres to lift the injunction on Ripple’s XRP sales. As part of the proposed settlement, Ripple would pay $50 million to the SEC, while the other $75 million would be returned to the company.
Deaton didn’t stop at that. He opened up about his expectations, what he thought the SEC would do, what Ripple might have emphasized, and why the motion feels like a missed opportunity in some ways.
Deaton: What We’re Actually Seeing
“I wasn’t expecting flattery,” Deaton admitted. “And to be clear, I’m not knocking the lawyers involved. They’ve got more courtroom experience than I do; experience is the best teacher. In fact, the Ripple lawyer who signed the motion used to be a Director of Enforcement at the SEC.”
What was he hoping for? Some accountability, acknowledging how the SEC’s past leadership may have taken things too far with crypto enforcement. This is evident with the lawsuits filed by the SEC against Coinbase, Uniswap, Consensys, Robinhood Crypto, OpenSea, Gemini, and Yuga Labs, accusing them of operating as unregistered brokers, exchanges, or securities issuers.
Deaton pointed out the Debt Box case. The SEC filed a suit in July 2023 against Debt Box, alleging a fraudulent $50 million “node license” scheme. The regulator secured a temporary restraining order (TRO) to freeze the company’s assets. In December 2023, the SEC admitted it had not been accurate and candid in its filings.
It claimed some bank accounts were closed before testimony and accused Debt Box of preparing to relocate assets to the UAE, which turned out to be false. They also admitted to exaggerating claims about asset movements. The court ordered the SEC to pay around $1.8 million in legal and receiver fees and prohibited the agency from refiling the case. Two lead SEC attorneys resigned following the sanctions order.
And in Ripple’s own battle, Judge Netburn once said SEC lawyers showed a “lack of faithful allegiance to the law.” Harsh words from the bench. Deaton also thought this would’ve been the perfect time for Ripple to cite the bigger picture: the new wave of crypto legislation, like the GENIUS Act and the Clarity for Payment Stablecoins Act, that shows Congress is finally getting serious about regulation. In that context, keeping an injunction in place could be viewed as outdated and unnecessarily harmful.
And there’s a practical business angle here, too. Deaton noted how an ongoing injunction puts Ripple at a clear disadvantage, especially as it competes with other firms like Circle. “Banks and institutional players don’t want to deal with a company that has a legal cloud hanging over it,” he said. That alone could cost Ripple opportunities. At the time, XRP is trading at $2.16, reflecting a 1.64% increase over the past 24 hours.
