Trump accuses banks of undermining GENIUS Act as CLARITY stalls

President Donald Trump wrote on Truth Social that banks are threatening and undermining the GENIUS Act and warned they should not hold the CLARITY Act hostage as lawmakers remain deadlocked in the Senate. He urged Congress to finish market-structure legislation quickly and said Americans should be able to ‘earn more money on their money.’

The GENIUS Act, which lawmakers designed to provide a regulatory roadmap for stablecoin issuers, was approved earlier and is now facing pushback from banking representatives over how stablecoin rewards would be treated. A person familiar with the negotiations confirmed that banking groups submitted red-lined text seeking changes to the treatment of stablecoin yield.

The broader Digital Asset Market CLARITY Act of 2025 passed the House last year with bipartisan support and has been sent to the Senate. In the Senate, the Banking and Agriculture committees have advanced separate draft bills that have not been reconciled, leaving final market-structure legislation pending.

Banking officials and some industry lobbyists argue that yield-bearing stablecoins could pull deposits away from traditional banks and create regulatory arbitrage. Banking executives have pushed for stablecoin yields to be subject to rules similar to those that govern bank deposits. JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon told attendees at the Milken Institute’s Future of Finance event that stablecoin yields should face bank-style rules and called for a ‘level playing field.’

Officials at the White House have held meetings in recent weeks with representatives from both the banking and crypto sectors but have not brokered a compromise, according to people familiar with the talks. Trump had asked lawmakers to finalize market-structure legislation by the end of February; lawmakers did not meet that target.

Republican Rep. French Hill suggested the Senate could take up the House-passed CLARITY Act rather than reconcile separate committee drafts. Senator Cynthia Lummis reposted the president’s message on social media and wrote that ‘America can’t afford to wait. Congress must move quickly to pass the Clarity Act.’

The CLARITY Act would assign specific roles for the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission in overseeing parts of the crypto market and aims to set jurisdictional boundaries for digital assets. Backers say the bill would bring clearer rules and help integrate crypto into the U.S. financial system. Banking groups are seeking tighter limits on stablecoin rewards to reduce competitive pressure on deposit-taking institutions.

Negotiations continue in Congress and between industry stakeholders over the final language that would govern stablecoin issuance and the oversight responsibilities of federal regulators. Lawmakers must reconcile differing priorities from banking groups and crypto firms to advance the legislation.