Good news, crypto: Your legislative agenda might just survive the Senate!
Senate Majority Leader John Thune flipped a switch on Monday night that effectively ended the open amendment process around the GENIUS Act. That means senators will dodge several painful votes that could’ve otherwise been queued up as the Senate attempts to enact stablecoin reform.
Progressives, led by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), will lose their chance to force votes on a series of amendments covering presidential corruption, Big Tech, closing the Tether loophole, bolstering national security provisions and shoring up financial stability controls. Retail advocates, championed by Sen. Roger Marshall (R-Kan.), won’t get a vote on the Credit Card Competition Act.
It’s an abrupt end to a saga that, in fairness to everyone involved, was predictable. “Regular order” seems to lose its charm for every majority leader sooner or later in the modern Senate once legislation stalls on the floor for a couple weeks. Which is what happened here.
Thune reset the bill’s amendment tree and filled it, closing out the open-ended process by subbing in an amendment in the nature of a substitute from Sen. Bill Hagerty (R-Tenn.). That amendment contains the final version of the stablecoin bill, a combination of bipartisan changes needed to bring along a bloc of crypto-friendly Senate Democrats and final technical tweaks. Read the 120-page bill here.
Democrats and Republicans are doing another round of amendment hotlines right now, but the effort doesn’t have the same heft with the tree filled up. Any additional amendments will require unanimous consent to be included. That’s not going to happen with the CCCA or most other amendments of note, but we’ll keep an ear out.
In other words, the crypto world could have a blissfully boring week ahead in the Senate.
What’s next? We have a rough run-of-show for you. Without a time agreement, the Senate’s next round of GENIUS votes will start Wednesday. Hagerty’s amendment in the nature of a substitute should get a vote around Thursday. That will likely set up a final passage vote on Monday, assuming time agreements remain elusive.
The GENIUS Act appears to have more than enough Democratic votes to clear the chamber’s filibuster. The last procedural vote on the GENIUS Act advanced 69-31. Sure, a couple of those Democratic “yes” votes have said they’re not totally sold on the final product. But are nine senators going to jump ship at this point? Not without a significant shift.
Don’t forget the House: Our friend Jesse Hamilton at CoinDesk had a good write-up with House Financial Services Committee Chair French Hill (R-Ark.) on the ways the chambers remain apart on stablecoin policy.
