If the crypto industry succeeds in getting its market structure legislation through the U.S. Senate and onto President Donald Trump’s desk, he may not sign it if he sticks to threats he has made to withhold his signature on any other legislation ahead of the election bill.
Trump, in the midst of managing a U.S. war against Iran, has paid particular attention to the SAVE America Act, which he declared his top priority in Congress. The proposed legislation would be designed to impose new barriers to voting in the United States, including identification requirements, proof of citizenship requirements and strict limits on mail-in ballots, which are expected to shrink voter rolls.
“This will guarantee the midterm elections,” Trump said Monday at a conference of congressional Republicans in Florida. “I’m willing to kind of say I’m not going to sign anything until it’s approved.”
He acknowledged that the effort — a new version of the previous Safeguarding America’s Voters Eligibility (SAVE) Act that has already passed the House of Representatives — will face a difficult time in the Senate, where he suggested four or five Republican lawmakers are not on board. In addition to election requirements, the bill would also focus on banning transgender athletes in women’s sports and gender-affirming surgery on children.
Democrats criticize the voter ID effort, calling it voter suppression intended to address a voter fraud problem for which there is no evidence, despite the president’s claims that he was deceived in the election.
Trump claimed that this law would guarantee Republican power in the United States for half a century.
“You’re going to win the midterms by levels you wouldn’t even believe,” Trump told the Republican audience. The Republican Party is widely expected to lose ground in the November congressional midterms, including a potential loss of the House majority, which current bets on Polymarket’s predictions market put at 85%. “You’re going to win every election for a long time until someone really screws things up, and I hope that doesn’t happen.”
But the president was also a key driver of the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act, which is the crypto industry’s main policy goal. His new stance that he won’t approve other bills ahead of his voter ID efforts casts a shadow over the digital asset push, which is working toward long-awaited approval from the Senate Banking Committee.
Negotiations over the market structure bill have been difficult, but crypto insiders remained hopeful that negotiations could find enough common ground as soon as this week that a hearing was scheduled to move it through committee. The legislation has already progressed through the Senate Agriculture Committee, so if it reaches the Banking Committee, a final version will need to be developed for a vote by the full Senate. Assuming the House approves it, because it already approved a similar bill last year, the bill would then reach Trump’s desk.
The crypto industry must now wonder to what extent the president has refused to sign anything, even a digital assets bill that he asked to be sent to his desk quickly. Establishing a pro-crypto regulatory system in the United States has been one of the top issues of the Trump White House, so passage of the Clarity Act will test whether Trump can force action on SAVE while continuing his crypto project.
