Senators are planning to release the updated text of a cryptocurrency regulatory bill shortly after a meeting with President Donald Trump on Thursday afternoon, Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio) told reporters.
Democratic senators are not expected to attend the meeting. Several Democrats said they wouldn’t support the version of the bill that could be released Thursday, suggesting it faces steep odds for passage.
Negotiations on the Clarity Act have gone back and forth for the better part of the past year. A major unresolved issue involves an ethics provision seeking to address Trump’s business ties to the crypto industry. The measure is a requirement for Senate Democrats, whose support is necessary to pass the bill through the chamber.
“We’ll do that right after the meeting,” Moreno said. “You guys have a lot of reading to do.”
Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.), who is also expected to attend the meeting, said in an interview Thursday she “certainly hopes” draft text is released after speaking with the president but didn’t confirm.
Moreno pointed to the time spent meeting with Democrats on the bill over the past year, and said “it’s time for a vote now, but the president asked for a briefing.”
The Ohio Republican said one of his main goals of the meeting with Trump is to get a vote on the bill before August recess.
Several Democrats said they wouldn’t support the version of the bill set for release Thursday because it lacks strong ethics provisions.
“They’re taking a version of the text to the president with their ethics provisions, not with anything that we agree to as Democrats,” Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.), a key negotiator of the legislation, said in an interview Thursday. “At the end of the day, we don’t have strong ethics. I don’t care what the president says. You’re not going to have the Democratic votes.”
Gallego said the version of ethics language he’s seen so far is “very weak” and gives “a lot of latitude to the president to continue doing his grift, and also it’s not very consumer protection friendly.”
Moreno has been adamant that the crypto bill “has the strongest ethics provision of any piece of legislation ever passed by any Congress.”
A Democratic Senate aide granted anonymity to discuss the unreleased draft said “the Republican plan being presented to the president is weaker than what Democrats will accept” and that “Democrats have not seen nor agreed to what is being presented to the White House.”
Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.), who has been working on the CFTC portion of the bill, said in an interview he’s still in active negotiations on the bill, which aren’t expected to be finished Thursday.
“I hope they’re not going to drop something before we finish our negotiation,” Booker said. “The only way to get this done is a bipartisan pathway.”
CORRECTION: An earlier version of this report misstated Democratic Sen. Ruben Gallego’s party affiliation.
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