Geoff: President Donald Trump hosted a gathering with the highest paying customers of his personal cryptocurrency business.

Sparking bipartisan concerns he is selling access to the presidency for personal profit.

The dinner held at his northern Virginia ballclub was to organize seals of his cryptocurrency -- sales of his cryptocurrency coins.

The guests at the dinner provided a video of the president to the New York Times.

>> We have been pushing the market of crypto and Bitcoin and everything.

I do it for a reason, not for me but because I think it is the right thing to do.

Geoff: The gathering featured hundreds of guests including Lamar Odom and a well-known crypto investor who has reportedly spent more than $40 million on president trump's points.

>> It is really nice to be here today with everyone.

It is a great moment in crypto.

Geoff: He was once under investigation by the sec and doj for securities fraud after Mr. Trump took office.

Joining us now to discuss all of this is Eric Lipton who covers the intersection of the presidency and Mr. Trump's businesses for the New York Times.

To secure a seat for the dinner last night, attendees had to be among the top 220 holders of the trump meme coin.

How does this all work?

How has the president and his family, how are they profiting?

Reporter: This is an unusual situation.

This is not a campaign contribution that supports a candidate.

This is money going directly to Donald J. Trump, his sons and his family along with their business partners.

You have individuals here with his position as president and he is urging people to buy the cryptocurrency meme coin in exchange for getting access to him at a dinner and visiting the white house.

I was outside the white house today while 25 of the vips come of the biggest holders of his cryptocurrency, I watched as they entered and exited the white house.

This is where you pay to play.

You are paying to get access and directly and personally benefiting financially the president and his family.

Geoff: The guest list was private but tell us more who was in the room including the 25 you just mentioned.

Reporter: The guest list was private but we obtained a copy and we know who was at the dinner and we have identified many of them and communicated with many of them.

They come from all over the world but particularly from Asia, China, Singapore, Singapore.

Many are cryptocurrency players from Asia and they are seeking in some cases to enter the U.S.

Marketplace and there are seeking a regulatory blessing from the trump administration to begin to seek profits in the United States.

Geoff: Let's talk more about the ethical concerns because there are two mainly -- Donald Trump is profiting off the presidency by selling access and this type of event allows foreigners the opportunity to purchase access to the president and the constitution bans a president from writz leaving foreign gifts or money without congressional consent.

Reporter: As well, it is an election law violation.

But they give him money directly and his family and that is what is happening.

The president is exempt from the federal conflict of interest law.

The president and vice president are exempt.

He is taking actions that benefit the cryptocurrency industry and actions that directly benefit some of the individuals that benefit -- he is not criminally liable for that conflict of interest because he exempt from that and the supreme court has ruled that any type of a notion of a bribe it if it involves an official action by the president he is largely protected.

The president is doing what he wants and asserts he has no conflicts of interest and the companies are run by his sons or associates so therefore he does not have a conflict of interest.

But we look at is financial disclosure report we see he personally financially benefits from the same corporate entities benefiting from these cryptocurrency sales.

Geoff: White house press secretary yesterday said the president was attending during his personal time but in that video we saw the presidential seal on the lectern.

And our president trump's business dealings influencing the administration's policies especially regarding cryptocurrency?

Reporter: The quid pro quo is hard to prove when you have an explicit action in exchange for a financial gain.

What you have is sequentially that there does appear to be a sequential relationship between people investing in literally billions of dollars in the trump family related cryptocurrency companies and the president is pushing for actions by the federal government or taking the actions himself that benefit some of the same companies.

These things are happening.

They are factually occurring.

Whether he is doing them explicitly in exchange for the financial benefits he is getting is to some extent up to a prosecutor or a court to document.

We don't know for certain but creates the appearances of a conflict of interest and it is unusual and there is nothing like it in American history.

We have had other families of presidents involved in various engagements from the oil industry with hunter Biden working as a consultant for example and even selling paintings.

But we never had such an intense and far-reaching corporate engagement that personally benefits the president as we are seeing right now with president trump and his family.

Geoff: Eric Lipton from the new York Times, thank you for joining us.

Reporter: Thank you.