Guest Writer James Fotis is a retired police officer, disabled U.S. Army veteran, and author of HR218, which expanded nationwide concealed carry protections for qualified active and retired law enforcement officers.
The Clarity Act, which would bring a regulated Crypto market to the United States, would help reduce theft, collusion, and close regulatory and ethical loopholes for consumers and investors.
Yet while it passed by the Senate Banking Committee on May 14, 2026, by a vote of 15-9, it has been met with a blind eye, causing it to be stalled in the Senate.
Some of that delay is driven by a misconception that this bill somehow weakens law enforcement's ability to police digital asset markets. However, that is not the case.
The Clarity Act gives law enforcement more flexibility to respond to illicit activities in the crypto market. Every day this claim goes uncorrected is another day investigators lose ground to bad actors already exploiting the regulatory gaps that have led to illicit activity and billions in losses.
Senators hesitating on public safety grounds should know that many groups in the law enforcement community have reviewed this legislation carefully and concluded that it provides clear rules and regulations to hold bad actors accountable.
One of the loudest misconceptions is that the Clarity Act loosens oversight of digital asset markets. That interpretation is inaccurate; the bill reverses that.
The Clarity Act significantly expands anti-money laundering, sanctions, and compliance obligations for regulated intermediaries. Exchanges, brokers, dealers, and custodians would be subject to registration, supervision, examinations, record-keeping, and enforcement under a single federal framework.
That federal framework ranges from the Secret Service to the FBI, encompassing all the agencies within that structure, strengthening the ability of law enforcement. That is exactly the kind of structured oversight law enforcement has been asking Congress to deliver, and it is dependent on Senate votes.
A second concern that keeps coming up is centered on the Blockchain Regulatory Certainty Act (BRCA) provisions of the Clarity Act. Some critics have suggested BRCA narrows law enforcement's ability to go after criminals using digital assets. It does not.
BRCA does not affect law enforcement’s authority to investigate or prosecute money laundering, fraud, sanctions violations, terrorism financing, or any other crime. The bill preserves every tool used against actual criminals and directs enforcement resources at the people committing them.
It also enhances the ability of Federal Monitoring and enforcement Agencies to work more efficiently under the US legal system. This is important as most of the criminal activity the Clarity Act will help law enforcement pursue and expose falls under federal jurisdiction.
Then there is the claim that pulling more digital asset activity into the U.S. regulatory system somehow “helps” bad actors. The Clarity Act pulls activity onto U.S. soil and under U.S. rules.
When responsible companies operate here, they answer to American regulators and American courts. That gives investigators visibility they do not currently have and fewer places for criminals to hide offshore.
Some critics also argue that blockchains make it easier for criminals to move money, when in fact they are one of law enforcement's most effective investigative tools.
Unlike cash, blockchain transactions leave a permanent, transparent record that investigators can trace and act on. The Clarity Act protects those capabilities and helps keep this technology under American leadership, where U.S. national security professionals can continue to use it.
Law enforcement organizations across the country have worked through these questions and reached the same conclusion.
The National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives has endorsed the Clarity Act, calling it legislation that provides meaningful new capabilities while preserving longstanding criminal enforcement authorities.
The Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association also supports the bill, and the Major County Sheriffs of America has also withdrawn its opposition to the legislation after engagement with stakeholders and the Administration. The law enforcement community is not the obstacle here. It is the Senate.
The choice in front of Congress is not complicated. Senators can move the Clarity Act now and give investigators the tools they have been asking for.
Alternatively, Congress can let the bill stall out based on misconceptions, hand bad actors another year in the shadows, and the government can continue engaging in a regulation-by-enforcement pattern that benefits no one.
The crypto company Ripple spent nearly five years and hundreds of millions of dollars in court fighting the Securities and Exchange Commission to secure a ruling that the XRP token itself is not a security.
When a single lawsuit takes four years and hundreds of millions of dollars, builders pull back, innovation stalls, and consumers suffer. This is why there needs to be clear, defined rules.
They empower law enforcement to pursue real bad actors, give innovators the certainty to build in the United States rather than abroad, and give consumers the protections a patchwork of lawsuits can never deliver.
If the Clarity Act does not pass before the August recess, crypto skeptics will keep setting policy through litigation, one costly case at a time, and Americans will continue to pay the price.
It’s time to pass the Clarity Act to get the American economy moving and to empower the men and women in blue to do their jobs.
If you are involved with crypto in any manner, please contact your US Senators and ask them to vote “YES” for the Clarity Act to protect consumers and to give law enforcement the ability to more effectively police crypto markets.
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