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In the early morning of September 16, Beijing time, the U.S. Senate held a final debate (cloture) roll call vote on the motion to enter consideration of H.R. 3633, the "Digital Asset Market Clarity Act." According to the Senate's daily news release, the vote began at approximately 2:18 PM Eastern Time on September 15 and the results were announced at 3:00 PM: 49 votes in favor, 50 votes against, with Delaware Democratic Senator Chris Coons not voting. A total of 60 votes are needed to end the debate, and the motion failed.

This is not the final passage or rejection of the bill text. The failure only indicates that the Senate could not end the procedural debate on "whether to commence consideration," and full chamber debate, amendments, and final passage votes cannot occur temporarily. The bill remains listed on the Senate agenda (Calendar No. 423), and majority leader John Thune theoretically can reintroduce the cloture motion; North Carolina Republican Senator Thom Tillis, who voted against it, immediately proposed a motion for reconsideration, leaving the door open for reopening the process in the future.

The voting pattern is clear. Among the 53 Republican seats, 49 voted in favor; the four Republicans who voted against were Susan Collins (Maine), Josh Hawley (Missouri), Jerry Moran (Kansas), and Tillis. Among the latter three, Collins, Hawley, and Moran are opposed in substance; Tillis switched from support to opposition as a means to align himself with the "winning side" to propose reconsideration. Of the 45 Democrats, 44 voted against; the two independents Angus King and Bernie Sanders both opposed. No Democrats or independents were in the supportive column. Even if all 53 Republican seats supported it, they would still be 7 votes short of the necessary 60. The actual gap is 11 votes.

On July 17, 2025, the House passed the measure by a vote of 294 to 134, with 78 Democrats crossing party lines to support it. On May 14, 2026, the Senate Banking Committee passed it by a vote of 15 to 9, with only Democrats Ruben Gallego and Angela Alsobrooks in favor. The Senate Agriculture Committee has additional supporting texts. On August 8, Thune submitted the motion to advance, and the first procedural vote was left for the September session. On September 14, Cynthia Lummis, John Boozman, and Tim Scott announced the so-called "final, best, and last" text, claiming it included 126 substantive amendments proposed by the Democrats. Hours before voting, Republicans rejected the Democrats' counter-proposal, and negotiations broke down.

It should be noted that the stablecoin specialized law "GENIUS Act" took effect on July 18, 2025, and this failure does not repeal existing stablecoin legislation.

Basic Content of the Bill

The core issue the "Clarity Act" aims to resolve can be summarized in one sentence: Is a token regulated by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) or the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC)? For the past decade, this issue has progressed through enforcement lawsuits and institutional positions without legislative resolution. This bill is a successor to the FIT21 bill from the House in 2024, spanning approximately 600 pages. Key contents include:

Division of Assets. Tokens that are sufficiently decentralized and whose value primarily derives from network use (typically "digital commodities" like Bitcoin and Ethereum) are allocated to the CFTC, which will regulate the spot market and register digital commodity exchanges, brokers, and dealers. "Investment contract assets" tied to financing, centralized teams, or investment contracts will continue to be under the SEC's jurisdiction. Licensed payment-type stablecoins will follow the "GENIUS Act" track; this bill primarily addresses market structure issues adjacent to stablecoins rather than rewriting stablecoin issuance rules. A common expression for a mature blockchain test is that no single entity controls more than 20% of the supply or governance to be treated as a digital commodity. The SEC and CFTC must jointly formulate rules for mixed trading, portfolio margining, conflicts of interest, and more.

Intermediaries and Market Structure. Digital commodity exchanges, brokers, and dealers must register; provisions on qualified custodians, customer property segregation, best execution, related-party transactions, and limits on conflicts of interest arising from vertical integration are written into the Agriculture Committee's provisions. State consumer protection laws are clearly preserved. The SEC's anti-fraud and anti-manipulation powers are not diminished. The CFTC is granted additional funding authority (the public text includes implementation resource arrangements on the order of approximately $150 million).

Anti-Money Laundering and Law Enforcement. Digital commodity intermediaries are incorporated into the "Bank Secrecy Act" financial institution category and must comply with suspicious transaction reporting and sanctions compliance. The Treasury Department expands its authority over cross-border digital asset transactions involving significant money laundering risks. Exchanges and stablecoin issuers may set temporary freezes on suspicious transactions and obtain a civil liability safe harbor when conditions are met. Specific felonies related to financial crime, cybercrime, money laundering, or terrorism financing may lead to disqualification from license applications for a certain period.

DeFi and Developers. Protocols that do not meet decentralization standards must follow securities and anti-money laundering rules; front-end platforms must comply with sanctions. The accompanying "Blockchain Regulatory Certainty Act" provisions are narrowed to: developers generally shall not be directly deemed money transmitters for providing software and have a civil safe harbor established; criminal liability extensions are tightened in the final version.

Stablecoins and Banks. Passive interest issued solely for holding payment-type stablecoin balances is prohibited to prevent direct withdrawals of bank deposits; rewards linked to payments, usage, staking, governance, and other behaviors are allowed. The final version includes a "circuit breaker": when the Treasury Secretary formally recognizes large-scale withdrawals of community bank deposits into stablecoins, he may restrict rewards in response to concerns from community banks and agricultural state legislators about credit contraction.

The ethics provisions are the largest addition in the final version. Covering the President, Vice President, members of Congress, federal judges, and their spouses: during their term, they shall not issue or sponsor digital assets, and significant crypto-related economic interests must be sold or transferred to qualified blind trusts. State attorneys general gain certain enforcement roles to file lawsuits against trading platforms that violate regulations related to listed assets and the Justice Department's inaction. Civil penalties are reported publicly as a certain percentage of the transaction price or a fixed upper limit, with differing expressions in various versions. Democrats criticize: the provisions do not apply retroactively to past transactions, do not cover minor children, do not prohibit endorsements or promotions, enforcement still heavily relies on the federal Department of Justice, and the entire ethics arrangement has a sunset clause upon term expiration.

Reasons for Rejection

Analysis suggests that the direct reason for rejection was the failure to form a bipartisan coalition. Republicans needed at least 7 Democratic or independent votes and obtained none; they also lost 3 opposing votes within their party.

Ethics is the main fault line. Democratic negotiating representatives noted the Trump family's reported crypto-related income of approximately $1.4 billion in 2025, stating that the final version still left "no mandatory comprehensive divestment, enforcement authority concentrated in the current Department of Justice, and state attorneys general cannot directly hold the president accountable." Mark Warner later stated that the enforcement and national security controversies were close to being resolved, but that the "conflict of interest of public officials profiting from this industry" had not been resolved, thus opposing the bill. Gallego's statement was firmer: he could not support any text "that gives the president more time to profit from crypto." Elizabeth Warren stated that the bill poses risks to families, the economy, and national security and that the ethics provisions do not prevent the next billion-dollar gains. Hours before voting, Democrats submitted a counter-proposal overnight, which Republicans rejected without further concessions. All involved in months of negotiations, including Gillibrand, Warner, Booker, Warnock, Gallego, Alsobrooks, and Cortez Masto, voted against it.

Banks and stablecoins are the second line of contention. Community banks oppose stablecoin rewards that withdraw deposits and weaken credit to farmers and SMEs. The circuit breaker was deemed by the banking association as coming too late and having thresholds that were too high. Agriculture states like Kansas, where Moran is from, are sensitive to this issue. Hawley has historically held reservations about the concentration of big tech and crypto platforms. Collins' voting record generally leans cautious, aligning this time with Democrats.

Partisan costs are magnified before the midterm elections. With November's midterms approaching, Congress will soon adjourn this month. Democrats are unwilling to codify "market structure" as legislation that could be interpreted as a gift to the industry without a thorough severance of Trump's crypto business interests. The Republicans set Sunday’s text as definitive and did not reopen the amendment process. Lummis stated before the vote to reporters: if the cloture fails, "I think we’re done." Both sides viewed the procedural vote as a political conclusion, rather than "open the door first and then could amend."

Technical misinterpretations need to be excluded. Failure does not mean "the Senate rejected crypto" or "the U.S. banned crypto." The existing enforcement authority and rule-making powers of the SEC and CFTC remain; the "GENIUS Act" is still being implemented. The failure equates to: the current Congress has closed the window for categorizing SEC/CFTC with written law, shut by the 60-vote threshold.

X Evaluation

After voting, Cynthia Lummis, a Republican senator from Wyoming and the bill’s main proponent, shifted all responsibility to the Democrats: claiming they "have never seriously taken consumer protection and the U.S. leadership seriously," stating "conditions are immediately raised"; and wrote, "They voted against true restrictions on politicians’ personal crypto investments today… handing America’s leadership to China and all foreign competitors." "The once-proud Democrats are now anti-consumer, pro-illegal financing, and anti-ethics… the Democrats are now un-American. Sad!" Before voting, her message was "now or never," citing to reporters that she presented "over 120 demands; enough already."

Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong wrote after the vote that the bill's failure to advance today is "disappointing"; bipartisan dialogue may continue, but "we cannot wait for Congress any longer." He believes the SEC and CFTC already have the existing authority to clarify the rules, "regardless of what Congress does, clarity will come." The "GENIUS Act" is actually more lenient regarding stablecoin rewards, stating "some concessions we swallowed in the 'Clarity Act' are hard to digest, but perhaps it’s better this way." "Crypto innovation is not going back." Before voting, he simplified the options to: support would lead to innovation, consumer protection, official ethics, and enforcement tools being implemented simultaneously; opposition would hand the financial future to other countries, "history and crypto voters will not forget."

Commentator Scott Melker framed the result as a congratulation to traditional large bank lobbying and reminded that the "GENIUS Act" is still law, and exchanges may still do yield products within that legal framework. Analyst Noel Acheson’s judgment is colder: before the midterms, we should not expect further market structure legislation. Journalist Eleanor Terrett listed all the Democratic negotiating representatives who voted against it, and relayed a text from an industry leader: "It’s dead." Arizona Democratic Senator Gallego's public statement attributed the failure to "the Republican refusal to say no to the president." Before voting, Warren summarized the agenda on X as: Republicans are pushing a bill "that allows Trump to continue profiting from the crypto industry."

Future Predictions

The short window is nearly closed. With only about seven weeks of effective legislative time remaining before the midterms in November, the Senate still has to address funding, nominations, and other priority agendas. Securing 10 more shifting votes or reopening the text announced as closed by Republicans carries political costs that exceed legislative benefits. Lummis' assertion of "we’re done," the industry's message of "it’s dead," and predictions of single-digit probabilities in the market point to the same judgment: the baseline scenario for law passage within 2026 is failure. Tillis’s motion for reconsideration and Thune’s agenda retention preserve procedural possibilities, but without a new coalition, it’s just waste paper.

Regulation will not be in a vacuum. However, White House crypto advisers have stated: even if legislation does not pass, the SEC and CFTC will continue to advance rules under existing authority. The market should turn to agency rules, enforcement cases, and the implementation details of the "GENIUS Act" (federal banking regulators must complete rules within statutory deadlines, with the full effect of the stablecoin law no later than on or around January 18, 2027). For exchanges and issuers, this means "waiting for one big law to clarify everything" is transformed into "continuing to operate under two sets of agency standards."

2027 will be the real fork. If the Republicans maintain control of both chambers, they may try again with ordinary legislation outside of lowering threshold texts or budget reconciliation, with ethics provisions still likely being a price for the Democrats. If the Senate changes hands, revising market structure legislation is more likely, with consumer protection, public official interests, and anti-money laundering provisions being strengthened, and the industry’s friendliness decreasing. Regardless of who wins, the legislative line of FIT21 - "Clarity Act," which traversed from 2024 to 2026, has already broken, and the next round will almost certainly shift in numbering and negotiation teams.