Is the Clarity Act Bill Dead? Will Democrats Vote Yes After the Midterm Election? | Cody Carbone

Tony Edward (0:00)

We're going to pretend like we're doing this, and then after the elections, maybe we'll come back to the table to try to get this done.

Cody Carbone (0:07)

I think that's the question we're all asking ourselves right now, in the aftermath of the Clarity Act vote. Did Democrats ever want to vote yes? I saw there was a statement from seven Democrats last night, were committed to getting this done.

That's easy to say after you vote no.

Tony Edward (0:27)

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Link will be in the description. Hey folks, welcome into The Thinking Crypto Podcast. I'm Tony Edward.

Amanda Wickroft (1:15)

And I'm Amanda Wickroft.

Tony Edward (1:17)

And joining us is Cody Carbone, who is the CEO of The Digital Chamber. Cody, great to see you. Lots to talk about.

Cody Carbone (1:24)

Yeah, thanks for having me. Good to see you, Tony and Amanda.

Tony Edward (1:27)

So Cody, Tuesday was a rough day. Clarity Act did not make it through the Senate in the initial cloture vote. We were hoping that would happen. I would love to get your take on what happened there and why this vote failed.

Cody Carbone (1:40)

Yeah, it sucked. There's no sugarcoating it. It was a disappointing day, but we're not defeated. You know, I think what ultimately happened is that politics beat policy.

Every Democrat decided to vote no together. Even the 10 to 15 that have been working with us on this forever. And that's really disappointing. And it became a political effort where this is a 630-page bill. Ethics is about four pages of this, and it was four pages that determined the fate ultimately of this bill. So it's not the end of the world, and I'm sure we'll get into what's next, but it does suck. It really does. I thought I was cautiously optimistic after Sunday evening when Republicans released new texts where I looked at it, and I think they were looking at it and saying, wow, they gave the Democrats almost everything they wanted here.

This hopefully will be smooth sailing. That's probably naive for any Washington legislative effort, but I was definitely disappointed.

Amanda Wickroft (2:45)

I guess that's my night. Do you think Republicans should have anticipated this a little bit more from the Democrats?

Cody Carbone (2:52)

You know, I've seen a lot of like Monday morning quarterbacking online about like what Republicans should have done differently. And yes, I, you know, there definitely should have been a bipartisan drafting effort from the very beginning, but this bill had over 120 changes from Democrats.

And then when I looked at the concessions that were being made, some of them at the expense of the digital asset industry, because I was not thrilled with some of them, I said, man, this is exactly what the Democratic offices told us that they wanted. You know, especially as it relates to the Blockchain Regulatory Certainty Act, unstable coin yield, and then in the ethics provision, yeah, it wasn't 100% of what they wanted, but it's a negotiation. And it was, you know, 80%, I think is what Republicans came out of what the Tillus-Gaego proposal was. And to me, 80%, if we're just looking at this like a high school quiz, 80% is better than 0%. And I'm shocked that they decided to take over 80 So I was pretty surprised by that.

Tony Edward (3:57)

Cody, do you think, you know, you mentioned the 80% that Trump agreed to and much more. Do you think the Democrats, their plan all along, though, was, you know what, we're not going to give President Trump and the administration a win before the midterms. We're going to pretend like we're doing this. And then after the elections, maybe we'll come back to the table to try to get this done.

Cody Carbone (4:17)

I think that's the question we're all asking ourselves right now in the aftermath of the Clarity Act vote. Did Democrats ever want to vote yes? I saw there was a statement from seven Democrats last night were committed to getting this done. That's easy to say after you vote no.