The House late WednePressday advanced a trio of cryptocurrency bills and a 2026 Defense spending measure after a group of GOP hard-liners dropped their opposition to the effort following a chaotic day of turnabouts and negotiations with Republican leaders.
The House voted 217-212 to advance the bills following a closed-door standoff between House conservatives and the leaders of the Financial Services and Agriculture committees, which crafted the crypto legislation. The vote was held open more than nine hours for the negotiations.
GOP hard-liners, who tanked a procedural vote on the bills Tuesday afternoon, were pushing to merge a sweeping crypto market structure bill known as the “CLARITY Act” with separate, partisan legislation to ban a central bank digital currency.
The GOP chairs of the Financial Services and Agriculture panels, Reps. French Hill (R-Ark.) and G.T. Thompson (R-Pa.), respectively, opposed that plan, fearing it would kill off Democratic support for the market structure bill.
