Trump’s ‘crypto council’ has ‘no juice’ as it stumbles out of the gate on key Capitol Hill vote: sources
President Trump’s crypto czar David Sacks and his sidekick Bo Hines are facing backlash from some industry leaders after legislation over a key digital coin had stalled on Capitol Hill, On The Money has learned
The two members of Trump’s “crypto council” – Sacks, a high-profile venture capitalist, and Hines, a lawyer and former GOP congressional candidate from North Carolina – have been whiffing in their attempts to push through much-needed stablecoin legislation, crypto industry sources say.
After lots of last-minute arm twisting by the legislation’s sponsor, GOP Tennessee Sen. Bill Hagerty, the bill will finally come to a vote in the coming days.
Stablecoins are crypto assets backed by real assets, such as those denominated in US dollars like US treasuries, and they’re becoming increasingly popular in the burgeoning digital coin business.
Without passage of a stablecoin bill, industry insiders say it will be next to impossible to push through a broader overhaul of the digital coin regulation that is also being planned.
Meanwhile, the stablecoin legislation could help funnel US Treasuries into these investments, leading to possibly lower interest rates, and bring about better disclosure of the stablecoins’ backing, one of the top criticisms of both this asset class and the crypto business in general.
The crypto council, officially called the Presidential Council of Advisers for Digital Assets, is a brainchild of Trump, promised during his campaign as a way to push pro-crypto legislation through Congress. Getting legislation that resets the rules for the $3.45 trillion crypto business would help fulfill Trump’s campaign pledge to make the US the world’s crypto capital.
“David and Bo are well meaning but they don’t really have the juice in the Senate to get this thing done,” one crypto industry insider told On The Money.
He pointed to the procedural vote last week to bring the bill to the floor for a full debate. Two Republicans in the GOP-controlled Senate, Rand Paul of Kentucky and Josh Hawley of Missouri, voted against the measure – along with most Democrats – thus delaying any action until just as On The Money goes to press.
Sacks declined to comment but Hines told On The Money that the characterization that the White House and the council aren’t pushing hard enough, or don’t have the political juice, for the passage of the bill is “completely false.”
He blamed the delays on recalcitrant Democrats who had supported the bill, but for political reasons backed out. Hines, the executive director of the crypto council, called their actions a “litmus test for the folks on the other side of the aisle” who are preventing digital innovation that the legislation would provide and the American people voted for in electing Trump.
He noted that the bipartisan legislation is being sponsored by Hagerty and New York Democratic Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand.
“We are participating when helpful and will continue to engage to get this across the finish line,” Hines added.
Gillibrand had no comment. Sources tell On The Money that Hagerty worked the phones through Thursday to get enough Dems to bring the bill to the floor for a formal vote.
His goal was to get the legislation before the Senate before it becomes focused on the President’s “Big Beautiful Budget,” which could push off crypto legislation indefinitely.
“The White House has been an integral partner in getting the (legislation) to a place where the Senate is poised to move on this historic legislation,” Hagerty said In a statement to On The Money:
If all goes according to plan, Hagerty will bring the stablecoin bill for a full senate vote Friday or sometime next week.
For a time, that was a big “if” given the political factors at play. The bill — known as the GENIUS Act—needs 60 votes to avoid a filibuster, which means Dem support is necessary given the Senate math.
Hagerty thought he had those votes until Dems like anti-crypto Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren whipped up opposition by demanding language that prevents Trump — who has regulatory authority over crypto through his appointments to the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission — or any future president from profiting from crypto before signing on.
The president and his wife Melania have a meme coin, of course. World Liberty Financial, a so-called di-fi venture (decentralized finance offers an alternative to traditional banking) is majority owned by the Trump Organization.
There is also some concern that a foreign stablecoin company named Tether, the industry’s largest, would benefit despite criticism over what’s exactly behind its dollar-backed assets (Tether has long contended that its stablecoins are fully supported by US-backed assets and its disclosures are proper).
Hagerty is arguing to Dems that stablecoins have nothing to do with the president’s crypto side hustles, and are necessary for industry innovation, which most of them supported before Warren & Co., started tying their vote to Trump’s business interests.
That said, getting crypto-friendly legislation through even a closely divided Congress was supposed to be easy given the bipartisan support for lighter regulation and general agreement that the old way of regulating digital coins through enforcement actions stymied innovation in crypto’s blockchain technology, a potentially revolutionary way of transacting business.
It has been anything but easy. That’s why there’s so much finger-pointing at Sacks and Hines.
