A U.S. Senate committee formally advanced the crypto market structure bill on Thursday, taking the next step with legislation that the industry hopes will help it reach a new plateau of investor confidence and involvement.
It’s the crypto industry’s largest policy effort ever in the Senate, although there are some headwinds. The committee working on the bill was the Senate Agriculture Committee, and its Republican chairman chose to walk away from negotiations and vote on the legislation without bipartisan support. The Republican outcome – which will quickly end in a 12-11 vote – will still need to garner significant Democratic support before it can ultimately overcome the Senate’s structural hurdles.
“After months of work, we have made significant progress, truly significant progress working together,” committee Chairman John Boozman said as the panel began its work. “Now is the time to move this process forward.”
In the long-awaited markup session, Democrats lined up as a unified bloc to oppose Republican preferences, illustrating the partisan impasse that has yet to be overcome. Several Democrats have indicated they hope to continue working on it to reach a bipartisan version, and Boozman himself acknowledged that the text could be updated through a manager’s amendment before moving through the Senate.
“The progress that’s been made here is good, but I think we feel like we’re not quite done yet,” said Sen. Amy Klobuchar, the panel’s top-ranking Democrat. “I hope we can continue to negotiate as this bill moves forward.”
The Agriculture Committee is one of two groups that must ultimately approve the bill. However, it is the Senate Banking Committee that may have the most difficulty, as its version of the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act contains some of the most controversial elements, including the issue of stable coin yield. This effort, however, has been delayed in its own scope and blocked by the search for a compromise that would satisfy a number of interests, including Wall Street banking lobbies.
The White House intends to hold another meeting next week in an effort to find common ground between crypto, banking, Republican, Democratic and administration interests. President Donald Trump and his representatives have pushed back on a few central points of the legislative effort, including Democrats’ demands that he and other top government officials not stand to personally benefit from crypto business interests.
Sen. Corey Booker, the lead Democratic negotiator, said the White House had made progress on the bill “infinitely more difficult.” “It is ridiculous that the President of the United States and his family have made billions of dollars from this industry and they are still trying to create a framework here without the type of ethics that would prevent this kind of gross corruption in our country,” Booker said.
Thursday, the first amendment of the hearing addressed the ethics aspect of the Democrats.
Boozman also appears to support another of Democrats’ demands, which is that the Commodity Futures Trading Commission be given a full slate of commissioners as it takes a lead role in overseeing crypto.
“Having a fully staffed, bipartisan commission is critical,” he said.
The chairman noted that the committee must now work with its counterparts on the Banking Committee and with lawmakers in the House of Representatives to find something that can be supported by both parties. He also said some of the proposed amendments were better suited to this committee’s version of the bill.
If all goes well, here is what is needed to turn the bill into law:
- After the bill cleared the Senate Agriculture Committee on Thursday, it will ultimately have to do the same in the Banking Committee.
- The separate versions are expected to be combined for a final bill in the Senate, which could give the bill’s supporters another chance to satisfy holdout Democrats.
- A combined bill could then go to the Senate for a final vote.
- A yes vote at this point takes the bill back to the House of Representatives, which has already passed its own version of the bill by an overwhelming majority.
- Another approval sends the Clarity Act to Trump to be signed into law.
The crypto industry is already sitting on a high-stakes victory this session of Congress, having signed a bill into law to govern stablecoin issuers in the United States, securing its first major legislative victory in the United States. But the industry has an increasingly narrow window to pass the even bigger bill as the Senate fights for federal funding and draws closer to the November midterm elections.
Read more: Live Blog: Senate Agriculture Committee Advances Crypto Market Structure Bill
