CLARITY Act, the Senate can still relaunch the crypto text but time is running out

The CLARITY Act just missed its first procedural vote in the US Senate. 49 votes for and 50 against, while 60 were needed to open the debate. Crypto analysts, however, are not losing hope. According to them, the US crypto regulation bill is not officially dead. The Capitol still has a few weeks of parliamentary session to vote on it. Enough to keep crypto investors in suspense!

CLARITY Act: a procedural vote that already kills the hope of rapid crypto regulation

This Tuesday, September 15, 2026, the Senate did not vote on the substance of the CLARITY Act. The vote mainly concerned the authorization to debate it. With 40 votes for and 50 againstthe text HR 3633 therefore remains blocked before even having been discussed on the merits.

Those who follow the negotiations closely agree on one point: the result is not that surprising. Before the vote, the predictive markets had even already anticipated the rejection of this crypto bill. On Polymarket for example, the probability of success fell from 83% in February to only 13% in August.

The Democratic camp voted en bloc against moving forward with the text, joined by three Republicans:

• Susan Collins;
• Josh Hawley;
• Jerry Moran.

Two independents did the same: Angus King and Bernie Sanders. Furthermore, two elected Democrats who had nevertheless supported the crypto law text in the banking committee in May turned around at the decisive moment. They are Ruben Gallego (Arizona) and Angela Alsobrooks (Maryland).

In order to defend the Democratic Party’s position, Senator Elizabeth Warren said on X:

This angle of attack centered on ethics obviously weighed heavily in the final negotiations.

Why is American crypto regulation stumbling over 126 concessions?

The question deserves to be asked: how can a crypto text with so many compromises such as CLARITY Act can it still fail? Direct answer: because political trust is not negotiated line by line, contrary to the text of the law.

However, the Republican senators had integrated 126 changes demanded by Democrats before the vote. The final package included an ethical framework aimed at:

• the president;
• the vice-president;
• members of Congress;
• federal judges.

Added to this:

• a right of enforcement vested in state attorneys general;
• protections for non-custodial developers, crypto miners and validators;
• a Treasury mechanism supposed to prevent returns on stablecoins from draining the deposits of small banks.

Democrats made a counteroffer Monday evening. The Republicans, however, rejected it Tuesday morning. Result: back to square one, despite months of back and forth.

Another striking detail: the return of Mitch McConnell, 84, after three months of absence due to a fall and hospitalization in June. The senator from Kentucky voted to advance the text. A strong political gesture since the Republicans only hold 53 seats in the Senate. They therefore mechanically depend on Democratic votes to reach 60.

US regulation: Tillis’ gesture opens a door, without bringing votes

Thom Tillis, Republican senator from North Carolina, voted against the CLARITY Act crypto bill in order to request a review. He filed this motion at 3:01 p.m., according to the Senate press service. This detail therefore changes the reading of the ballot: his negative vote responded to procedural logic.

Indeed, the request for reconsideration makes it possible to consider a new attempt. However, it proves neither the existence of a sufficient coalition nor the fixing of a new vote.

Thus, the CLARITY Act remains technically alive. He keeps its place on the calendar, under number 423. Which allows Majority Leader John Thune to retry a cloture vote at any time. Moreover, a transitional parliamentary session after the mid-term elections remains theoretically possible. However, it promises to be busy: budget, pending files and the same tensions which caused the text to sink on Tuesday.

If nothing comes to fruition before the end of the 119th Congress, everything will start from scratch in January 2027 :

• new presentation of the text;
• new passage in committee;
• new coalition to rebuild in the Senate.

In the meantime, the SEC and CFTC continue to operate under the existing legal framework. These US crypto regulators each pursue their own regulatory agenda on digital assets. The GENIUS Act, for its part, remains completely unchanged. Decryption: the American crypto regulation advances in dispersed order rather than through a single, coherent text.

In the wake of the vote, the price of bitcoin is dropped back below the $76,000 mark. Which erases the previous day’s gains. Worse still, the flagship cryptocurrency is nearing a nearly four-week low.

In any case, one thing is certain: crypto regulation in the United States is currently going through its most critical zone of turbulence. If the Senate misses this window of opportunity, innovation will permanently take hold outside the United States. Above all, the US crypto industry will have to deal with a patchwork of rules and uncertainty for a long time to come.