House Republican leaders have reached a deal to advance three major cryptocurrency bills after a procedural vote stretched into the longest in House history, lasting over nine hours.
The vote, which ended late Wednesday with a narrow 217-212 passage, had been held up by a group of Republican hardliners demanding an outright ban on central bank digital currencies (CBDCs). These holdouts initially refused to support any movement on the bills unless a CBDC ban was guaranteed to pass.
In response, House Majority Leader Steve Scalise announced that Republican leadership would instead insert a CBDC ban into the National Defence Authorization Act (NDAA) — a must-pass defence spending bill. Scalise told reporters that the decision to shift the CBDC ban to the NDAA paved the way for progress on the crypto package.
NEWS: SCALISE says they’re attaching the anti-CBDC bill to the NDAA.
Holdouts were demanding a path for that bill to Trump’s desk. Scalise says there’s an “agreement” on that with NDAA.
— Mychael Schnell (@mychaelschnell) July 17, 2025
This legislative push, which House leaders have dubbed “Crypto Week,” aims to pass three key bills: the CLARITY Act, the Anti-CBDC Surveillance Act, and the GENIUS Act. PunchBowl News reported that Scalise plans to hold a vote on the GENIUS Act and CLARITY Act as early as Thursday. However, Speaker Mike Johnson indicated that votes on bills other than the GENIUS Act could be delayed to Friday or even into next week.
The internal Republican standoff had earlier derailed an attempt to advance the package on Tuesday. Representative Keith Self, one of the original holdouts who later flipped his vote, had voiced concerns that the GENIUS Act might inadvertently create a pathway for a CBDC, despite bill text clarifying it does not expand the Federal Reserve’s authority to offer services directly to the public.
Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene was the sole Republican to side with Democrats in opposing Wednesday’s measure.
Republican Representative Tim Burchett explained in a video posted to X that negotiations concluded with a plan to attach the CBDC ban to the NDAA. He noted that further amendments to the GENIUS Act risked killing it entirely if it were returned to the Senate.
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