Failure of the Clarity Act in the Senate: crypto lobbying put to the test

“Money is the mother’s milk of politics. » (Jesse Unruh) The crypto sector paid gallons to Washington in the first half of 2026. Eight million dollars in lobbying was used to push the Clarity Act, according to federal declarations compiled by CoinDesk.

The text was finally to distribute roles between the SEC and the CFTC on digital assets. On September 15, he failed in the Senate by one vote.

However, the Clarity Act has not lacked support. On July 17, 2025, the House of Representatives adopted it by 294 votes to 134, including 78 Democrats (legislative file H.R. 3633). The text entrusts digital assets treated as raw materials to the CFTC. The SEC keeps those sold under an investment contract.

In the Senate, the mechanics have seized up. The agriculture and banking committees adopted their versions in January then in May 2026. The closure motion, tabled on August 8, arrived at the meeting on September 15. It failed by 49 votes to 50, far from the 60 required, and without a single Democratic vote (Senate vote no. 234). Thom Tillis voted against it on purpose. This vote allows him to demand a new election.

On the Democratic side, Ruben Gallego and a dozen senators upped the ante. They demanded safeguards on the Trump family's crypto activities, from World Liberty Financial to American Bitcoin mining. The banking lobby has pushed in parallel to lock in any remuneration for stablecoin holders. And this point made the first financier of the text waver: Brian Armstrong had withdrawn support from Coinbase in January (CoinDesk).

However, the checks have not stopped sending out. Coinbase comes out on top with around $2.2 million spent on the text, ahead of Kraken ($1 million). Digital Currency Group, Jump Crypto and Paradigm round out the pack. The sector spent $13 million on lobbying over the six months, according to CoinDesk’s tally. The Blockchain Association alone claims more than 380 meetings with parliamentary collaborators.

The infantry is not new. Public Citizen already identified 320 crypto lobbyists in 2021, or more than one for every two elected members of Congress. Their number had almost tripled in three years.

But while the Senate stalls, most of the sector's demands are moving forward through regulations. Paul Atkins' SEC launched Project Crypto in the summer of 2025. In September, it validated generic listing standards that opened the door to dozens of altcoin ETFs. Then she began work on a taxonomy of tokens. The CFTC, for its part, opened spot trading of cryptos on the futures exchanges it supervises, including leverage.

So the lobbyists got a lot, except the one thing they were paid to get. An administrative rule is undone as quickly as it is written. A law would survive the next tenant of the SEC. The Senate is still in session until November 6, but the House has left Washington to campaign.