The US Senate Banking Committee allowed April to close without scheduling a markup for the CLARITY Act, officially missing the target window after the Kevin Warsh Fed nomination consumed the committee's calendar. With Congress breaking for Memorial Day recess on May 21, the bill now needs to complete a Banking Committee markup, a 60-vote Senate floor vote, and three reconciliation steps in under four weeks.
Galaxy Research puts passage odds at 50-50 or lower, while TD Cowen is more pessimistic at one-in-three. However, Galaxy Digital founder Mike Novogratz and Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse both say the bill still gets done in May.
Senator Cynthia Lummis delivered the clearest public commitment yet on the Clarity Act's timeline at the Bitcoin 2026 conference on Sunday. "We are going to mark up the Clarity Act in May," Lummis told the crowd. "We are going to get it to the finish line. We are going to have the market structure that allows us to innovate, you innovate, America to lead the world on this freedom asset." Lummis described Bitcoin as more than just an investment, framing it as a tool for financial independence. "It's an asset you can carry anywhere, transfer cheaply, and hold yourself," she explained. She pointed to real-world use cases, from people sending funds across war zones to individuals leaving difficult situations with their wealth intact, as proof of Bitcoin's real utility.
