U.S. House's 'Crypto Week' Shifts Toward Getting All Legislation Out Thursday

The U.S. House of Representatives' on-again, off-again "Crypto Week" has turned into a crypto day as a dispute among Republicans found a late-night resolution and the lawmakers hatched a plan to pursue all of its crypto legislative votes late Thursday.

The Digital Asset Market Clarity Act — the industry's top priority, which would set out rules for U.S. crypto markets — is first on the agenda in voting set to take place just before 4 p.m., according to House plans. Then comes the second priority: the Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins (GENIUS) Act, which would establish government oversight of stablecoin issuers.

That second vote would be the last step before GENIUS could become U.S. law — the first major U.S. crypto policy.

In a one-two-three strategy, the lawmakers would then handle a bill to ban a U.S. central bank digital currency (CBDC) — the issue that caused Republican members of the House Freedom Caucus to derail earlier procedural steps to advance the bills as they worked to get assurances that the CBDC issue would find its way into must-pass legislation.

The procedural votes that were expected to be routine on Wednesday turned into a lengthy ordeal in which House Republicans fell into debate over the CBDC component, stretching the procedural delay almost to midnight and putting off the expected Wednesday vote on the Clarity Act.

Back on track now, the White House is eagerly setting up a Friday afternoon ceremony in which President Donald Trump can sign the GENIUS Act, officially meeting one piece of a promise to the industry that his administration would establish U.S. crypto regulations this year.

"This is common-sense, forward-looking legislation," said Representative French Hill, the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, during a Thursday House floor debate on the GENIUS Act.

"Wow, we're actually legislating," Hill said. "We're seeing bills passed in both chambers."

However, Representative Maxine Waters, the committee's ranking Democrat, argued the bill would "plant the seeds for the next financial crisis."

Though GENIUS may be in the lead, the Clarity Act to oversee the rest of the industry is much larger and more complex than the stablecoin bill. Though Senator Tim Scott, the chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, set a Sept. 30 deadline for his chamber to finish similar market structure legislation, a number of difficult hurdles remain to be cleared in that 10-week period.

First, his committee hasn't yet shared the language of the bill it's been working on, which has so far only been described through a series of "principles" the panel's Republican leaders issued. Then the bill also has to be approved by the Senate Agriculture Committee, which held a hearing on the topic this week but isn't as advanced in its work on this topic.

With objections already raised by Senate Democrats to the existing proposals — including from the ranking Democrats on both committees — "working through Democratic concerns on market structure will take well into the fall, and quite possibly beyond," predicted Beacon Policy Advisors, a firm that tracks regulatory developments in Washington.

Though Scott said the senators would use the Clarity Act as a "strong template," crypto lobbyists are expecting a substantially different bill in the Senate. That would mean the House would face at least one more vote on crypto market structure down the road.

If the House's Clarity Act vote goes as planned on Thursday, it's expected to see a big bipartisan result (with industry lobbyists so far expecting more than 30 Democrats to get on board). Crypto insiders are laser-focused on the number of Democrats backing that effort, which they believe will have an effect on the enthusiasm of the Senate to pursue its own bill.

An especially strong result — akin to the 71 Democrats a predecessor bill drew in the previous congressional session — "will put pressure on the Senate to act," said policy analyst Jaret Seiberg of TD Cowen, in a client note, describing the market structure effort as much more important for the sector than GENIUS, "as it will establish the regulatory regime for trading platforms and tokens."

So far, this Senate has shown a strong inclination toward crypto policy, having passed the GENIUS Act with a lopsided 68-30 result. But the market structure legislation could face a tougher road, because it's more complicated, and Democrats have been raising angry opposition to President Trump's personal business ties to the industry, which some lawmakers argue constitute a corrupt conflict of interests.

Read More: 'Crypto Week' Back on Track After Lengthy House Do-Over Vote

UPDATE (July 17, 2025, 15:52 UTC): Adds comments from lawmakers during the House floor debate on legislation.