Crypto Insiders Say Daily Senate Meetings Keep CLARITY Act Alive

With time running out to strike a deal on cryptocurrency legislation, U.S. senators remain divided on several issues, Semafor reported Thursday (June 25).

Those issues include potential restrictions on President Donald Trump’s ability to profit from digital assets, how to fill empty seats at the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), how to govern yields on stablecoins, and how to combat illicit finance, according to the report.

Senators interviewed by Semafor had differing views on the likelihood of a deal being struck on the crypto bill.

Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.) said lawmakers hope to get a bill to the Senate floor in July.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) said of the negotiations: “There’s a path there, it’s just that we’re kind of running out of time.”

Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) said: “I’m pretty down on the lack of progress.”

Supporters of the bill hope to reach a bipartisan deal before the fall midterm elections, which will take away momentum from this and other legislative priorities, per the report.

Bloomberg Government reported Thursday that Lummis said lawmakers will soon release an updated draft of the CLARITY Act that will address some of the outstanding issues.

Kristin Smith, president of the Solana Policy Institute, said in a Thursday post on X that while many people in the crypto community are concerned about the progress of the CLARITY Act, and there’s never a guarantee that legislation will pass, she strongly believes there is a path to get the bill to the President’s desk.

There are active conversations going on between senators of both parties, the White House, the crypto industry and other stakeholders, Smith said in another post.

“There are daily in-person meetings between key negotiators at the member level,” Smith said in a third post. “That wouldn’t be happening if no one thought this could go anywhere. In Congress, time is scarce, and CLARITY has a lot of attention.”

In Thursday post on X by the Blockchain Association, the organization’s CEO, Summer Mersinger, said that negotiations around outstanding issues in the CLARITY Act are “active, serious and solvable … A July vote should remain the goal — and is, in my view, absolutely achievable.”