Craft Ventures V: What David Sacks First Fund Since the White House Signals for LPs

TL;DR: Craft Ventures filed a Form D with the SEC on August 7, 2026 for Craft Ventures V, LP, an indefinite-size venture capital fund that people close to the raise say is targeting roughly $1 billion. It is David Sacks' first flagship fundraise since he stepped down as White House AI and crypto czar in March 2026. LPs should treat the "policy access" story as a marketing hook, not a diligence answer, and ask harder questions about what Sacks can and cannot do with what he learned in Washington.

The Filing: What Craft Ventures V Actually Says

On August 7, 2026, an entity called Craft Ventures V, LP filed Form D with the SEC. Form D is the notice private funds file when they sell securities under a Regulation D exemption, meaning they raise money from accredited investors without a full public registration. I pulled the filing text directly from EDGAR. It lists the issuer as a Delaware limited partnership operating out of Craft's San Francisco address, structured as a pooled investment fund of the venture capital type. The offering amount is listed as indefinite, with no capital sold, no investors, and no first sale date as of the filing. That is normal for a Form D filed at the start of a raise. It is a formality, not a fundraising milestone.

Sacks is named as an executive officer through his role as managing member of the entity serving as the fund's ultimate general partner. Craft President Mark Woolway signed the document, the same executive who signed Craft's Fund IV paperwork in 2023.

The filing itself doesn't state a dollar target. That number comes from reporting. The Information broke the story on August 11, citing the securities filing plus two people with knowledge of the effort, and put the target at roughly $1 billion. TechStartups.com and Dealroom picked up the same reporting. If Craft hits that number, it would push the firm's total LP capital raised past $4 billion. One structural detail matters here: Craft is reportedly moving away from its prior two-fund model, where it split capital between an early-stage vehicle and a dedicated growth fund. Fund V is described as a single vehicle aimed at companies from Series A onward. That's a real change in how the firm allocates capital, not a cosmetic rebrand.

Craft's Fundraising Track Record, Fund By Fund

Sacks and Bill Lee co-founded Craft Ventures in 2017. Sacks previously served as PayPal's first COO and founded Yammer, which Microsoft bought for $1.2 billion in 2012. The firm's growth in committed capital has been steady and, until now, predictable in its cadence.

Fund	Year Closed	Size
Craft Ventures I	2018	$350 million
Craft Ventures II	2019	$500 million
Craft Ventures III + Growth I	2021	$1.12 billion combined ($612M / $510M)
Craft Ventures IV + Growth II	2023	$1.32 billion combined ($712M / $608M)
Craft Ventures V	Targeting 2026-27	~$1 billion (target, unconfirmed)

By the end of the 2023 raise, per Craft's own announcement, the firm's total assets under management stood at $3.3 billion. Craft's disclosed portfolio includes OpenEvidence, Replit, Supabase, and defense-tech shipbuilder Saronic, along with earlier bets like Affirm and ClickUp. This is a firm with a real track record independent of Sacks' 14 months inside the Trump administration. That matters for how you read this raise. Craft was not a struggling shop that needed a headline-grabbing government stint to get back in the room with LPs.

The Timeline: 130 Days, Two Waivers, and an Exit That Looked Sudden

Sacks was appointed White House AI and Crypto Czar in December 2024, at the start of Trump's second term, serving as a special government employee, or SGE. That designation caps work at 130 days over a 12-month period and lets someone keep private-sector jobs while advising government. On March 26, 2026, Sacks told Bloomberg Television he had used up his 130 days and was transitioning to co-chair the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, or PCAST, alongside Michael Kratsios. The Verge reported that his exit followed a rough policy stretch, including a push to preempt state AI laws that alienated Republican governors and cost him political capital inside his own coalition.

During his tenure, Sacks operated under two ethics waivers issued under 18 U.S.C. § 208(b)(1), one covering crypto interests in March 2025 and one covering AI interests in June 2025. The waivers, both publicly posted by the White House, describe Sacks and Craft divesting more than $200 million in crypto-related and AI-adjacent holdings, including his personal stakes in Meta, Amazon, and Taiwan Semiconductor, plus Craft's direct position in xAI. He also initiated the sale of limited partner interests in roughly 90 venture funds, including five Sequoia vehicles, as a precaution against holding stakes in companies his policy work might touch. At least $85 million of the divested total was attributed directly to Sacks personally.

That sounds thorough. It also drew pushback. Senator Elizabeth Warren sent a letter to the Office of Government Ethics in May 2025 questioning whether the waiver process was rigorous or performative, noting Sacks was co-hosting a $1.5 million-a-head crypto industry dinner while shaping the administration's crypto policy. Ethics scholar Kathleen Clark called the arrangement "graft" in a TechCrunch investigation, arguing the waivers provided legal cover rather than resolving the underlying conflict. I do not think either framing stands alone. The divestment dollar figures are large and verifiable. The fact that Craft kept investing in AI, cybersecurity, and enterprise software the entire time Sacks held a policy post is also verifiable. Both things are true at once, and LPs need to sit with that discomfort rather than pick the version of the story that flatters the check they are about to write.

Why This Fund Raise Is Different From a Normal Vintage

Every venture fund pitch leans on some form of access. Sequoia sells its brand. Andreessen Horowitz sells its media apparatus and portfolio services. What is different about Fund V is that the access being sold is not reputational, it is regulatory. Sacks spent 14 months inside the room where AI chip export rules, stablecoin legislation, and a national AI framework got written. He co-chaired the President's Working Group on Digital Asset Markets. He has a phone number for people at Treasury and OSTP that almost no other general partner in Silicon Valley has.

That is genuinely valuable information, and LPs should expect it to show up somewhere in Craft's pitch deck, even if it never appears on a slide labeled government relations. The question is not whether Sacks retains that value. He does. The question is what he is legally allowed to do with it, and whether Craft's existing conflict-management setup, built for a firm with no sitting-czar overhang, is adequate for a fund that will spend three to five years deploying capital into exactly the sectors Sacks used to regulate.

Is Access a Real Edge, or a Story LPs Tell Themselves?

Here is where I get skeptical, and where I think generalist coverage of this raise gets lazy. Deal flow from political access sounds like an edge and functions, in practice, like a narrative. Deal flow in venture does not come from knowing a regulator. It comes from founders wanting your check because you add value, from other funds wanting you in the syndicate, and from a track record that lets you win competitive rounds. Sacks already had that before he went to Washington. Craft's 2021 and 2023 vintages closed at $1.12 billion and $1.32 billion combined, no White House credential attached.

Ask yourself what specifically changed. Did Sacks get better at sourcing companies, or did he get a list of policymakers who do not write term sheets? Those are different assets. A list of regulator contacts helps a portfolio company navigate a compliance question or get a meeting. It does not source the next OpenEvidence. If Craft's pitch conflates a former czar with better deal flow, that is the tell you are being sold a narrative instead of an edge.

Where I would push harder is on informational asymmetry, not access. Did Sacks, during his 130 days, learn anything material and non-public about upcoming AI chip export policy, stablecoin rules, or procurement priorities that Craft's portfolio construction for Fund V now reflects? That is a legitimate LP question, and a very different one from asking whether he knows important people.

How Should an LP Actually Diligence This?

Generic reference calls will not get you there. A politically connected GP requires a diligence process that goes past the standard institutional limited partners advisory committee, or LPAC, checklist. Here is what I would want in hand before signing a subscription agreement.

• Read the actual waiver documents, not the press summary. Both of Sacks' 2025 waivers are public. They list, by schedule, the specific holdings that were divested and which ones were not. If Fund V's investment thesis touches any name still sitting in an un-divested schedule, that is a direct question for the GP.
• Push on the LPA's conflicts-of-interest and information-barrier language. Most fund agreements have boilerplate conflicts language written for garden-variety related-party deals, not a former federal regulator in the general partner seat. Ask whether Craft added any specific policy on trading or investing based on information Sacks obtained in a government capacity, and who enforces it.
• Get a straight answer on what Sacks cannot invest in. The March 2025 waiver required Sacks and Craft to avoid acquiring new interests in companies directly and predictably affected by his AI and crypto duties, and required consulting White House ethics counsel before new deals in those categories. That restriction expired when he left the SGE role in March 2026. Ask whether any post-departure restriction or self-imposed policy still applies, in writing.
• Check the fund's sector concentration against what Sacks actually regulated. If Fund V leans into AI infrastructure, stablecoin-adjacent fintech, or defense tech, and Sacks personally shaped federal policy in those categories 18 months before the fund launched, that overlap is the crux of your diligence, not a footnote.
• Talk to at least one LP from the 2023 vintage. Ask if Craft's reporting cadence, valuation practices, and LPAC engagement changed at all during Sacks' time in government. A distracted or conflicted GP often shows up first in degraded fund administration, not in a scandal.

What Are the Real Risks Here?

I do not think the biggest risk to LPs is a headline-grabbing conflict-of-interest scandal. Sacks' waivers were public, his divestments were large and documented, and the legal framework, however imperfect, was followed. The bigger risks are quieter.

Start with key-person risk. Sacks spent over a year with reduced day-to-day involvement in Craft's investment committee while serving as SGE, even as Craft kept deploying capital. If Fund V's thesis depends heavily on Sacks personally sourcing AI and policy-adjacent deals, LPs are betting on his bandwidth and his continued proximity to Washington through PCAST, a role with no cap on hours but also no formal decision-making authority.

Then there is reputational contagion. Any future congressional inquiry into the 2025 waivers, even one that clears Sacks, drags Fund V's name into headlines during the exact multi-year window LPs are locked into an illiquid commitment. And the most mundane risk may matter most: a $1 billion single-vehicle fund concentrated in Series A and later rounds means a bigger check size per deal than Craft's prior split-fund structure. That changes portfolio construction and return dynamics independent of anything tied to Sacks' Washington chapter, and it deserves its own diligence line.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is Craft Ventures V and when was it filed?

Craft Ventures V, LP is a Delaware limited partnership that filed Form D with the SEC on August 7, 2026. The filing lists an indefinite offering amount with no capital sold and no investors as of the filing date, meaning fundraising was in its early stages. Reporting from The Information puts the target at roughly $1 billion.

Why does David Sacks leaving the White House matter for this fund?

Sacks served as White House AI and crypto czar from December 2024 until March 2026, operating under two federal ethics waivers that restricted new investments in companies his policy work touched. Those restrictions applied to his status as a special government employee and generally lapse once that status ends, so LPs should confirm in writing whether any post-departure limits still bind Craft's investment decisions for Fund V.

How much has Craft Ventures raised across all its funds?

Craft closed a $350 million debut fund in 2018, a $500 million second fund in 2019, a combined $1.12 billion across Fund III and Growth I in 2021, and a combined $1.32 billion across Fund IV and Growth II in 2023, bringing total assets under management to roughly $3.3 billion. A $1 billion Fund V would push total LP capital raised past $4 billion.

What should an LP ask before committing to a politically connected GP's fund?

Request the underlying ethics waiver or disclosure documents rather than relying on press summaries, confirm whether the LPA's conflicts-of-interest provisions were updated to address information the GP obtained in a government role, and ask directly whether the fund's sector thesis overlaps with policy areas the GP personally shaped. Reference calls with prior-vintage LPs about reporting quality and LPAC engagement during the GP's government tenure are also worth the time.

Author Disclosure: Jeff Barnes, MBA has no personal position in any company, fund, or platform named in this article. Angel Investors Network has no current commercial relationship with any party mentioned. AIN provides marketing and education services, not investment advice. Past performance does not guarantee future results. All investments involve risk, including loss of principal.