Many senators absent from ‘bipartisan’ crypto market structure hearing

Many members of the US Senate Banking Committee’s subcommittee on digital assets were not present for a hearing to discuss market structure.

In a Tuesday hearing, “exploring bipartisan legislative frameworks for digital asset market structure,” the subcommittee chair, Cynthia Lummis, said there had been “a lot of competing committees” on the schedule for the day, which may have explained why only five senators out of the 11 typically on the subcommittee were available to ask questions to former regulators and industry experts.

Republican senators Dave McCormick, Bill Hagerty and Bernie Moreno joined Lummis, another Republican, and Senator Angela Alsobrooks to ask questions of former US Commodity Futures Trading Commission Chair Rostin Behnam, Coinbase’s vice president of legal, Ryan VanGrack, Multicoin Capital’s general counsel, Greg Xethalis and University of Pennsylvania Wharton School Executive Director, Sarah Hammer.

*Five US senators were present for a digital asset market structure hearing on Tuesday. Source:* *US Senate Banking Committee*

The lawmakers questioned the experts on the principles behind the Senate’s potential introduction of legislation to establish a crypto market structure bill after its successful passage of a stablecoin bill, the GENIUS Act. Lummis seemed to acknowledge the lack of participation in the hearing, noting that she didn’t “want to come up with a piece of legislation that the other side of the aisle feels they haven’t had adequate input in.”

“I don’t understand what’s changed, at least with regard to this topic,” said Lummis on bipartisan engagement around crypto bills. “Now, I understand what happens when you have a set of leaders that are not engaged in digital assets, and then in comes an administration that has family members that are engaged in digital assets, and maybe that’s what this is about. Maybe this is about concern that certain people that have family members in the administration are going to be advantaged in some way by what we’re doing.”

Alsobrooks, the sole Democratic lawmaker appearing at the hearing, was not a regular member of the subcommittee and appeared to be sitting in for the ranking member, Ruben Gallego. She was a cosponsor of the original GENIUS Act and voted in favor of the amended bill.

Clarity for digital assets originating from the House or Senate?

Moreno also questioned why the proposed legislation appeared to be a partisan issue for many lawmakers, though neither he nor Lummis mentioned US President Donald Trump by name in discussing potential conflicts of interest with the crypto market structure or stablecoin bills.

Many Democrats in the Senate already voted with Republicans to pass the GENIUS Act on June 17, but some have suggested that they would continue to oppose legislation without a carve-out to address the president’s ties to the crypto industry.

The proposed market structure legislation in the Senate follows efforts in the House of Representatives to pass its own bill, the Digital Asset Market Clarity, or CLARITY Act. The legislation moved out of committee in June and is expected to be considered for a floor vote soon.

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