Latest / The Paul Barron Crypto Show / CLARITY Next Steps🔥Kristen Smith INTERVIEW🚨Solana Policy Institute

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CLARITY Next Steps🔥Kristen Smith INTERVIEW🚨Solana Policy Institute · The Paul Barron Crypto Show

0:00
Speaker 1: All right, let's dive into Clarity today because there's a
0:02
Speaker 1: lot happening now that it has moved out of the
0:05
Speaker 1: Banking Committee, and we're going to break all that down
0:08
Speaker 1: for you. We have a special guest coming over from
0:10
Speaker 1: the Salona Policy Institute. Let's just get started. I do
0:13
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0:51
Speaker 1: to bring in Kristin Smith, who is the president at
0:53
Speaker 1: the Salona Policy Institute today. How are you, Kristin?
0:57
Speaker 2: Good morning, Paul, great to be here and excited about
1:01
Speaker 2: the developments this week.
1:03
Speaker 1: Listen, it was a big week. Yesterday pretty much a
1:06
Speaker 1: rapid fire of amendments, and then of course those amendments
1:10
Speaker 1: pretty much were I don't know if they were shot down,
1:13
Speaker 1: but they were somewhat ignored coming out of the Senate,
1:16
Speaker 1: and maybe there were some deals that were made to
1:20
Speaker 1: kind of get into that, just to kind of get
1:22
Speaker 1: people going. I'll give you guys a few things. This
1:25
Speaker 1: was a few interesting developments and reactions from yesterday. This
1:29
Speaker 1: was Amanda Fisher. She was talking about the issue around
1:33
Speaker 1: I just don't get it. The industry spent years saying
1:35
Speaker 1: crypto didn't fall within the SEC's jurisdiction. Now we're seeing
1:39
Speaker 1: this kind of spin. You look at that, you also
1:43
Speaker 1: look at the ABA, which of course moved directly into
1:47
Speaker 1: doubling down on statements around what to do in term
1:51
Speaker 1: of advancing the Clarity Act, and of course at all
1:53
Speaker 1: centers around that right there, which is stable cooin yield. Guys,
1:56
Speaker 1: So you guys know this generating rewards is the sticking
2:00
Speaker 1: point for the ABA. So it's going to be a
2:03
Speaker 1: big one. What do you consider as bipartisan right now? Kristin.
2:08
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, you know, I mean, I think, as a
2:10
Speaker 2: technical measure, anytime you have a legislation where there are
2:14
Speaker 2: either co sponsors or votes where you have at least
2:18
Speaker 2: one senator from both sides of the aisle, that is
2:22
Speaker 2: technically considered bipartisan. But the real threshold here with the
2:27
Speaker 2: Clarity Act is we need sixty votes to get it
2:30
Speaker 2: out of the Senate, and there are fifty three Republicans,
2:34
Speaker 2: forty five Democrats, and two independents, and so you know,
2:38
Speaker 2: depending on if all the Republicans vote or not, you
2:41
Speaker 2: know you're going to need at least another seven. And
2:43
Speaker 2: so I think, you know, as you know, we look
2:47
Speaker 2: at this legislation, we want it to be bipartisan because
2:50
Speaker 2: it AA has to be bipartisan. But also the bills
2:53
Speaker 2: that are bipartisan tend to have more staying power. They
2:56
Speaker 2: aren't revisited anytime soon, Like they're really like the best
3:00
Speaker 2: negotiated deals because you have inputs from all sides of
3:05
Speaker 2: kind of the political spectrum. And so, you know, our
3:08
Speaker 2: hope is that you know, I think listen, going into
3:12
Speaker 2: the markup yesterday, there was a lot of nervousness around
3:16
Speaker 2: whether or not we would have Democrats joined the Republicans.
3:20
Speaker 2: It was clear we had all the Republican votes, but
3:22
Speaker 2: it was a question of whether or not we would
3:24
Speaker 2: get the additional Democratic senators to join. That did happen,
3:28
Speaker 2: and that means that this bill has a much much
3:31
Speaker 2: greater chance of getting floor time on the Senate floor.
3:34
Speaker 2: If it had been just a straight partisan line, it
3:37
Speaker 2: might not have had the momentum needed to finish the process.
3:40
Speaker 2: So I'm incredibly pleased that Senators Diego and Senators also
3:45
Speaker 2: Broke joined with the Republicans to get this bill out
3:48
Speaker 2: of committee into the next phase, because if that had
3:51
Speaker 2: not happened this week, it would have been very, very difficult.
3:54
Speaker 2: It starts to get very difficult to have enough time
3:57
Speaker 2: to complete the process before the end of the year.
3:59
Speaker 2: So very excited that we reached this critical milestone.
4:03
Speaker 1: Well, we're going to talk about timing here, because this
4:05
Speaker 1: is going to get very, I think, very dire if
4:07
Speaker 1: we don't get things moving quickly. You mentioned Gego and
4:11
Speaker 1: also Brooks, others that we're concerned about. Obviously, Mastow is
4:15
Speaker 1: in the hunt in terms of being able to turn
4:18
Speaker 1: into a yes vote, but with Diego and also Brooks,
4:22
Speaker 1: they did have a statement yesterday that kind of gave
4:26
Speaker 1: them an out. Yes, they were voting to get this
4:29
Speaker 1: through the committee, but it did kind of position it.
4:32
Speaker 1: Do you think they'll end up rug pulling us? I
4:35
Speaker 1: feel like, yeah, playing here.
4:38
Speaker 2: No, I certainly, I certainly hope they don't rug pull us. Obviously,
4:41
Speaker 2: each vote is an independent vote, and senators it's so
4:45
Speaker 2: prerogative to vote how they want. But I think that
4:48
Speaker 2: there there's been a lot of time and effort, both
4:52
Speaker 2: in the House, with the Senate, with the White House,
4:55
Speaker 2: that has gone into this bill, and I think that,
5:00
Speaker 2: you know, people start to they have skin in the game.
5:02
Speaker 2: They've spent hours and hours and hours negotiating this, and
5:05
Speaker 2: so it is my hope that you know, they they
5:08
Speaker 2: don't rug pull. Listen, Like we do this all the
5:12
Speaker 2: time right at Salana Policy Institute, when I was at
5:14
Speaker 2: the Blockchain Association. You want to preserve your optionality to
5:17
Speaker 2: continue to negotiate, and so oftentimes support at one stage,
5:23
Speaker 2: you know, doesn't necessarily mean support all the way through
5:25
Speaker 2: the process. So so no, I, but listen, I think
5:29
Speaker 2: that these senators, you know, I wasn't in the room,
5:31
Speaker 2: but my colleagues were in the room. We sort of
5:33
Speaker 2: divided and conquered yesterday. And the thing that I don't
5:38
Speaker 2: think was a parent from viewing it versus being in
5:40
Speaker 2: the room, is that negotiations were happening on this bill
5:45
Speaker 2: up to the very last minute. I think both the
5:47
Speaker 2: Republicans and the Democrats knew that if we wanted to
5:51
Speaker 2: keep this bill moving forward, like, there had to be
5:54
Speaker 2: some bipartisan support coming out of committee. And so, you know,
5:58
Speaker 2: there was a tremendous amount of activity the room. I think,
6:00
Speaker 2: you know, the fact that there was this recognition that
6:02
Speaker 2: it needed to be bipartisan to increase its chances was good.
6:07
Speaker 2: I think that, you know, the Republicans gave some concessions
6:10
Speaker 2: in order to get Diego and also Brooks's votes at
6:13
Speaker 2: this time, and I think that, but I think it
6:16
Speaker 2: just shows that they're committed to finding a pathway forward
6:20
Speaker 2: and you know, getting this to the Senate floor as
6:23
Speaker 2: quickly as possible.
6:24
Speaker 1: All Right, you just mentioned something there that the Republicans
6:26
Speaker 1: may have given some concessions. What would you think that
6:30
Speaker 1: concessions have been given so far in terms of just
6:34
Speaker 1: your opinion?
6:35
Speaker 2: Yeah, No, I think that there was one issue that
6:38
Speaker 2: I think we need to continue to work on as
6:40
Speaker 2: an industry. But this had to deal with sections three
6:45
Speaker 2: oh one and six o four. And for those of
6:47
Speaker 2: you who don't live in legislative build text all the time,
6:50
Speaker 2: this is the relationship between UH sort of the rule
6:54
Speaker 2: making for sort of non decentralized systems and the Blockchain
7:00
Speaker 2: Regulatory Certainty Act, which are the developer protections. And so
7:04
Speaker 2: there were a couple changes made to those sections, but
7:10
Speaker 2: there were also some changes related to bank amissibility, to tokenization,
7:17
Speaker 2: to insider trading, to customer protections. These were sort of
7:20
Speaker 2: the bipartisan series of amendments that were passed, and I think,
7:24
Speaker 2: you know, it was very exciting to hear Senator Diego
7:28
Speaker 2: when he first said that he planned to support for it.
7:30
Speaker 2: I think there was a real, you know, sort of
7:32
Speaker 2: sense of relief and excitement amongst those of us watching
7:36
Speaker 2: because it did show that there was a pathway forward
7:40
Speaker 2: on a bipartisan basis, and so very very exciting, very
7:43
Speaker 2: dramatic markup and a lot of activity being negotiated directly
7:48
Speaker 2: in the room.
7:50
Speaker 1: You look at what Sander was talking about. He's the
7:53
Speaker 1: one of the reporters over at the CRYPT and he
7:56
Speaker 1: mentioned also Brooks kind of holding on to this whole
7:59
Speaker 1: issue around ethics, which we've talked about quite a bit,
8:03
Speaker 1: but this is one of the things that we are
8:05
Speaker 1: concerned about that this could become another sticking point in
8:10
Speaker 1: terms of negotiations that are happening right now. We'll get
8:14
Speaker 1: to timing a second. Obviously, ethics are going to be
8:17
Speaker 1: a big part of this. Where do you think the
8:20
Speaker 1: line will get drawn? Do you guys have any opinion
8:23
Speaker 1: on what you think is going to come out of it?
8:25
Speaker 2: You know, I think it's a It's an interesting issue
8:29
Speaker 2: because this is legislation about regulating different participants in the
8:34
Speaker 2: crypto space. You know, the ethics is not really regulation
8:39
Speaker 2: of crypto. It's regulation and obligations that apply to government
8:44
Speaker 2: employees all the way up, you know, from the president
8:47
Speaker 2: down to the to the interns, right, and so this
8:52
Speaker 2: is really a politically driven issue. This is about Democrats
8:58
Speaker 2: wanting to hold you know, President Trump accountable for anything
9:03
Speaker 2: him or his family might be doing with you know,
9:06
Speaker 2: the crypto space. And so I do think for the
9:10
Speaker 2: crypto industry it's a little bit challenging because we're not
9:12
Speaker 2: really a party at this table, right, you know, we
9:16
Speaker 2: we I think the thing that that the crypto industry
9:20
Speaker 2: cares about, at least that we care about it, Slam
9:22
Speaker 2: a policy institute. Is we want, like the example I
9:25
Speaker 2: keep using, if we want a senator to go to
9:27
Speaker 2: the floor of the Senate and give a speech celebrating
9:30
Speaker 2: the Satoshi's the anniversary of Satoci's white paper, you know,
9:34
Speaker 2: we don't want We want them to be able to
9:36
Speaker 2: say the word bitcoin without them running into an ethics issue, right.
9:40
Speaker 2: We want we want senators to be able to talk
9:42
Speaker 2: about it, and especially as we see tokenization of assets,
9:46
Speaker 2: you know, everything is going to be on crypto rails
9:48
Speaker 2: at some point, and so we need to make sure
9:51
Speaker 2: that that the ethics Provision is written in a way
9:54
Speaker 2: where senators can have conversations that aren't being perceived as
9:59
Speaker 2: being like endorsement of a specific token. And so I
10:03
Speaker 2: think that you know, these conversations are ongoing. I know
10:07
Speaker 2: that there was a lot of work that was done
10:09
Speaker 2: between the Senate Democrats and the White House last week.
10:13
Speaker 2: But this is kind of a funny issue because it
10:15
Speaker 2: doesn't really have anything to do with the core part
10:18
Speaker 2: of the bill. They're definitely you know, focused on crypto
10:23
Speaker 2: industry assets and activity as opposed to just sort of
10:26
Speaker 2: broader general you know, Trump has a lot of real estate,
10:29
Speaker 2: for example, There's a lot of industries out there, and
10:31
Speaker 2: so it's a really delicate one and it's one that
10:36
Speaker 2: I think is not one that the industry is at
10:40
Speaker 2: the table on. But I do think as the bill
10:42
Speaker 2: moves forward and we negotiate and solve some of these
10:45
Speaker 2: other outstanding issues that are there, if the last thing
10:49
Speaker 2: that's left is ethics, I think there's going to be
10:51
Speaker 2: a tremendous amount of pressure both on the White House
10:54
Speaker 2: and the Democrats to find a deal and to attach
10:58
Speaker 2: that and get that done, because, as I said, there's
11:00
Speaker 2: just been you know, thousands and thousands of hours of
11:04
Speaker 2: work that has gone into this legislation, and I think
11:06
Speaker 2: people are going to want to see it across the
11:08
Speaker 2: finish line.
11:08
Speaker 1: I'm kind of I'm kind of curious now that David
11:11
Speaker 1: Sachs has stepped away from that position. You've got Patrick
11:16
Speaker 1: with kind of I guess leading the charge there. Who
11:20
Speaker 1: would be at least in the negotiation side from the
11:24
Speaker 1: administration that would maybe even get into a debate around ethics.
11:29
Speaker 2: Well Patrick is definitely the sort of main negotiator on
11:33
Speaker 2: behalf of the White House, and I think he's been
11:36
Speaker 2: doing a phenomenal job. And for somebody who you know,
11:40
Speaker 2: a year ago wasn't doing much with cryptopolicy, it's been
11:43
Speaker 2: really amazing to see how effectives he has been. I
11:47
Speaker 2: think that, you know, Listen, Patrick's going to go have
11:50
Speaker 2: to sell this upwards at the White House right when
11:53
Speaker 2: he did when he does have something on paper, and
11:56
Speaker 2: so you know, we wish him go luck in in that.
12:00
Speaker 2: But yeah, I do think, you know, David Zachs obviously
12:04
Speaker 2: continues to care. He chairs the peak CAST, which is
12:08
Speaker 2: the Advisory Committee for Science and Technology. He obviously continues
12:12
Speaker 2: to have a direct line to President Trump and cares
12:15
Speaker 2: deeply about this, but he's not doing the negotiations on
12:17
Speaker 2: a day to.
12:18
Speaker 1: Day basis, all right, So we have a lot happening
12:22
Speaker 1: additionally with some of other key senators out there, as
12:26
Speaker 1: far as Chuck Sumer. Schumer, you know, we've had him.
12:29
Speaker 1: He voted against the Genius Act. I'm looking at his
12:31
Speaker 1: page right here over on stand with crypto, but he
12:35
Speaker 1: was also on the SAD one twenty one Joint House resolution,
12:40
Speaker 1: so that had you know, some inklings of where we
12:43
Speaker 1: are now with clarity. So my question is how important
12:48
Speaker 1: is Schumer right now?
12:50
Speaker 2: Now? I think I think Schumer is very important. Schumer
12:53
Speaker 2: is a little bit interesting in that. I mean, he
12:55
Speaker 2: is a political person, right like, he operates, you know, everything,
13:00
Speaker 2: looks at everything through a political lens. He is, you know,
13:03
Speaker 2: the majority leader for the Democrats, and so you know,
13:06
Speaker 2: most of the Democrats are not going to vote for
13:09
Speaker 2: this bill. There's only going to be a handful, you know,
13:11
Speaker 2: maybe a dozen or so, maybe twenty if or for
13:15
Speaker 2: really good you know Democrats that will you know, eventually
13:18
Speaker 2: vote for this bill. And so you know, he has
13:23
Speaker 2: a duty to kind of his full party and his
13:26
Speaker 2: uh you know, ranking member and the Senate Banking Committee,
13:29
Speaker 2: Elizabeth Warren. But he also, you know, very much understands
13:33
Speaker 2: that crypto is an emerging industry. He represents New York.
13:37
Speaker 2: He you know, there's a lot of activity going on
13:39
Speaker 2: with the crypto industry and traditional finance, and so you know,
13:44
Speaker 2: he he's looking at this through a lot of different angles.
13:47
Speaker 2: I think that he's been very personally involved, and you know,
13:50
Speaker 2: he was making phone calls, uh you know, to the
13:52
Speaker 2: crypto industry this week. But I think his involvement is critical.
13:57
Speaker 2: Whether or not we get his vote may or may
13:59
Speaker 2: not matter if there are enough votes. But I think
14:02
Speaker 2: having him, you know, kind of push to get something
14:06
Speaker 2: across the finish line, even if he ultimately doesn't vote
14:09
Speaker 2: for it, is very helpful. Like with the Genius Act,
14:12
Speaker 2: he voted against that, but he was you know, helpful
14:15
Speaker 2: and trying to get you know, some of the votes.
14:18
Speaker 2: So he's a little bit of a complicated one. And
14:21
Speaker 2: but he's he's very active at this time, and you know,
14:24
Speaker 2: at least says that he's very committed to to moving
14:27
Speaker 2: this forward.
14:29
Speaker 1: Okay, so obviously there there are a lot of key
14:32
Speaker 1: votes here right now.
14:33
Speaker 2: Fifty.
14:34
Speaker 1: Do you anticipate any of the Republicans defecting?
14:39
Speaker 2: That's an interesting question. I hope not. Sometimes you might
14:43
Speaker 2: get someone and I'm not saying that he's going to
14:46
Speaker 2: do this, but just as an example, like a Senator
14:48
Speaker 2: Ram Paul who's very libertarian, you know, he might look
14:52
Speaker 2: at this and say this is too onerous a regulation
14:55
Speaker 2: for you know, technology like so you might get somebody
14:59
Speaker 2: like that. I'm not saying that's what he said he's
15:00
Speaker 2: going to do, but it's very likely that we will
15:04
Speaker 2: probably lose one or two Republicans, you know, unless it's
15:09
Speaker 2: a really really tight vote. But you know, we'll have
15:12
Speaker 2: to see and we'll know more. As the bill, you know,
15:15
Speaker 2: kind of moves out of the committee, you know, combines
15:18
Speaker 2: with the agriculture bill and gets ready for the floor,
15:21
Speaker 2: we'll start to see, you know, if there's any cracks
15:23
Speaker 2: on the Republican side. So yeah, I would expect we
15:26
Speaker 2: lose one or two. But you know that's why we
15:28
Speaker 2: need you know, a good number, you know, are more
15:32
Speaker 2: Democrats to get on this bill.
15:34
Speaker 1: For sure. I'm looking here at the calendar, Christen, this
15:38
Speaker 1: of course, yeah, this is getting tight. So here we
15:41
Speaker 1: are in May. We of course are seeing what will
15:45
Speaker 1: be you know, a holiday coming up in another week,
15:49
Speaker 1: so you've got that laying out right there in late May.
15:53
Speaker 1: Likelihood is people are probably going to be departing, you know,
15:57
Speaker 1: maybe on the twentieth or twenty first, uh, along with
16:00
Speaker 1: June not having as much exposure maybe or maybe the
16:06
Speaker 1: June is going to be the working month, I don't know,
16:08
Speaker 1: and then you only have you know, three weeks in
16:10
Speaker 1: July and then it's pretty much done outside of one
16:13
Speaker 1: week in August before we probably go to midterms. So
16:17
Speaker 1: in your anticipation. What's the timeline.
16:20
Speaker 2: Here, Yeah, well, I think there's there's a big push
16:22
Speaker 2: going on right now to try to get the Senate
16:24
Speaker 2: to take it up in June. You know, yes, there
16:28
Speaker 2: is some room that could slip to July, but the
16:31
Speaker 2: floor time really does need to happen this summer because Congress,
16:35
Speaker 2: you know, every year they take the August recess where
16:38
Speaker 2: they go home and they work out of their districts.
16:40
Speaker 2: When you come back in September, there are the Jewish
16:43
Speaker 2: holidays which limit the number of days that they can vote,
16:47
Speaker 2: and then there are also the it's the end of
16:51
Speaker 2: the fiscal year, right, so the government fiscal year. This
16:54
Speaker 2: is where they're working to pass legislation to keep the
16:56
Speaker 2: government open, to keep the government funded. And so this
16:59
Speaker 2: September floor time is largely accounted for. And then when
17:03
Speaker 2: we move to October, they tend to take that time
17:07
Speaker 2: to go home and get ready for the November election.
17:11
Speaker 2: And depending on what happens with the election, you know,
17:13
Speaker 2: sometimes that lame duck period in November and December is
17:16
Speaker 2: very productive. Sometimes it's not. It's really hard to know
17:20
Speaker 2: what the political situation is going to be like. So yes,
17:23
Speaker 2: they need to move as quickly as possible. And the
17:25
Speaker 2: Genius Act, if you recall Paul, was that took about
17:29
Speaker 2: four weeks of floor time, and that is a very
17:31
Speaker 2: long time. So yeah, there's going to be a big
17:34
Speaker 2: push to get this moving as quickly as possible. And so,
17:39
Speaker 2: you know, I think we're looking to hopefully get that
17:42
Speaker 2: process going by mid June at the latest.
17:44
Speaker 1: What is your what's your likelihood right now if you
17:47
Speaker 1: were the Christen polymarket.
17:50
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, I have a Kristen poly market every day
17:52
Speaker 2: and it's all over the place depending on the latest information.
17:55
Speaker 2: But I will say this, I'm probably at about sixty
17:59
Speaker 2: percent this gets done right now. Okay, that is the
18:03
Speaker 2: highest I have been throughout this whole process. I think
18:07
Speaker 2: that legislation is really really hard to do. There are
18:12
Speaker 2: so many different pieces that need to line up just right.
18:16
Speaker 2: The good news is all of those pieces are there.
18:18
Speaker 2: They're they're on the board, they're you know, we have,
18:22
Speaker 2: you know, in theory everything we need and now we
18:25
Speaker 2: need to get them all all lined up and in
18:27
Speaker 2: a row. And so I'm at about sixty percent right now.
18:33
Speaker 2: Just two weeks ago I was at forty percent. I
18:36
Speaker 2: think I had a real turning point when I was
18:39
Speaker 2: interacting with folks down in Miami. We had a really
18:42
Speaker 2: good bipartisan group of Senators and congressmen that came down
18:46
Speaker 2: to the consensus conference, and we're really actively engaged and
18:51
Speaker 2: being very productive. And so I would say like that
18:55
Speaker 2: the fact that we got through this markup has has
18:58
Speaker 2: put that above sixty for me. But there's listen, there's
19:01
Speaker 2: a lot that can go wrong. We don't want a
19:04
Speaker 2: lot to go wrong. We want this to go right.
19:05
Speaker 2: We want to get this done. And I think that's
19:07
Speaker 2: why everyone's working really really hard, because you know, if
19:10
Speaker 2: this gets bumped into next year, depending on the makeup
19:13
Speaker 2: of the House and the Senate, it might not be
19:17
Speaker 2: as much of a priority for getting this done. So
19:19
Speaker 2: we really need to try to take advantage of this,
19:22
Speaker 2: of the fact that we have so much work done
19:24
Speaker 2: and we have such a willing group of bipartisan senators
19:27
Speaker 2: that don't want to get it across the finish lane.
19:30
Speaker 1: I was looking at a tweet by Adam Mainhart. He's
19:33
Speaker 1: coming in. Yeah, we just had him on the show.
19:36
Speaker 2: He's fantastic.
19:37
Speaker 1: Yeah, he's been in DC for a while. And he
19:40
Speaker 1: had a statement in here that caused me a pause,
19:43
Speaker 1: and it was this statement right here that I highlighted.
19:45
Speaker 1: I don't know if you can see it. Let me
19:47
Speaker 1: zoom in on it for you a little bit. It
19:50
Speaker 1: is really in reference to CLARITYAC, but it boiled down
19:53
Speaker 1: to one thing. Serious work lies ahead on BRCA and ethics,
19:57
Speaker 1: and this is a reference to the negotiation. So when
20:00
Speaker 1: you think about that and you worry, I look at
20:04
Speaker 1: it and I go, wait a minute, maybe there's some
20:05
Speaker 1: negotiations being done by centralized exchanges as well. Coinbase is
20:09
Speaker 1: going to be one of the biggest ones out here
20:11
Speaker 1: has been fighting for this in terms of killing DeFi
20:15
Speaker 1: protections as a sacrificial lamb. Do you think because it's
20:19
Speaker 1: not in their interest, do you think that is possibly underway?
20:23
Speaker 2: No, I don't think that's underway. I do think the
20:27
Speaker 2: centralized exchanges and I obviously don't speak for that, but
20:30
Speaker 2: in my conversations with them, you know, they want to
20:34
Speaker 2: be at a gateway for people to get to the
20:37
Speaker 2: DeFi world, and they want to connect with DeFi and
20:40
Speaker 2: they have you know, Coinbase has base right, Kracken has
20:44
Speaker 2: has you know, their own I think it is called ink.
20:48
Speaker 2: I haven't used it, but they have their own like
20:50
Speaker 2: they they want to you know, be gateways to the
20:55
Speaker 2: DeFi world. And I think that the leadership at those
20:58
Speaker 2: companies like these are the o GZ right, Like they
21:02
Speaker 2: are not trying to recreate the old financial system with
21:05
Speaker 2: like a fintech wrapper, like they truly believe that that
21:09
Speaker 2: DeFi is really the entire point of crypto And so
21:14
Speaker 2: I'm not worried about this. This is very different than
21:16
Speaker 2: a couple of years ago when Sam Bateman Freed was
21:18
Speaker 2: going around with FTX and he was you know, he
21:21
Speaker 2: actually did have I think, you know, very harmful intentions
21:29
Speaker 2: towards DeFi. That is not the case today. And I
21:33
Speaker 2: think that the real source of this and any concerns
21:37
Speaker 2: around DeFi is a misunderstanding by law enforcement and by
21:41
Speaker 2: senators who have strong ties to law enforcement. You know,
21:45
Speaker 2: there have been a lot of conversations trying to get
21:49
Speaker 2: some of the law enforcement groups up to speed on
21:52
Speaker 2: how much that if you look at the entirety of
21:55
Speaker 2: the bill like this gives so many new tools for
21:58
Speaker 2: law enforcement and an entire regulatory framework that will help
22:04
Speaker 2: you know, law enforcement catch the criminals. And I think
22:06
Speaker 2: if in isolation, without the full context, you look at
22:10
Speaker 2: one little section here, in one section there you and
22:12
Speaker 2: you know, most people don't read the full bill, right
22:15
Speaker 2: like this is a three hundred plus pages. And so
22:19
Speaker 2: I think we're going to continue to do some work
22:21
Speaker 2: with the law enforcement and try to get them to,
22:24
Speaker 2: you know, sort of back down from this sort of
22:26
Speaker 2: very sort of narrow often like miss you know, sort
22:31
Speaker 2: of not factual statements that they're making, because there I
22:34
Speaker 2: think of real misunderstanding there that that that is the
22:37
Speaker 2: biggest threat to something like the Blockchain Regulatory searchgy Act,
22:41
Speaker 2: not the centralized six stages.
22:43
Speaker 1: Okay, not that And and really this kind of goes
22:46
Speaker 1: in line with what Senator Warren has been pushing for.
22:48
Speaker 1: But there's also a handful of others that are out
22:52
Speaker 1: there that have kind of aligned with it. We're starting
22:54
Speaker 1: to identify some interesting people that have not necessarily been
22:58
Speaker 1: in the negotiations before, at least on the Senate side,
23:01
Speaker 1: that could end up on it. So I think we're
23:03
Speaker 1: going to see a few new names. Anybody that you're
23:05
Speaker 1: watching outside of the obvious ones that we know of
23:09
Speaker 1: with Gagos, also Brooks, Mastow, anyone else that you think
23:13
Speaker 1: we need to kind of be on the lookout for.
23:15
Speaker 2: Yeah. I think Senator Mark Warner from Virginia is another
23:19
Speaker 2: important one. You know, he also leads up the Intelligence
23:24
Speaker 2: Committee on the Democratic side, and I think a lot
23:27
Speaker 2: of you know, he's a lot of colleagues, you know,
23:32
Speaker 2: off committee on the Senate floor, I think look to
23:35
Speaker 2: him for how to handle something like this, given his
23:38
Speaker 2: tech background and his intelligence background, and so I think
23:41
Speaker 2: he's going to be kind of a critical one on
23:45
Speaker 2: the Democratic side that if he gets to a good place,
23:48
Speaker 2: you know, he'll bring several votes along with him.
23:51
Speaker 1: What about van Holland, do you think he would.
23:53
Speaker 2: Be Ben holds a potential Van Hollins in the mix.
23:58
Speaker 2: I think he's an option. I mean, I think, I mean,
24:01
Speaker 2: I think if we can get you know, if we
24:04
Speaker 2: can get a deal, I think it's not going to
24:06
Speaker 2: be a close vote. I think it's going to be
24:07
Speaker 2: actually a very strong vote in the Senate. I think
24:10
Speaker 2: it's just going to be a question of, you know,
24:13
Speaker 2: can we find something that works for the Democrats that
24:16
Speaker 2: also you know, doesn't overly harm the industry because you know,
24:21
Speaker 2: if we do start to take away and eroad these
24:24
Speaker 2: developer protections and we do make it very burdensome for
24:29
Speaker 2: new startups to operate here in the US. You know,
24:32
Speaker 2: all of a sudden, the bill is you know, not
24:35
Speaker 2: going to be a net positive for the industry. It'll
24:37
Speaker 2: be in that negative. And so it's really important that
24:39
Speaker 2: we keep a couple of these key provisions in there
24:43
Speaker 2: so that developers feel like they can come back to
24:45
Speaker 2: the US and launch their companies, launch their protocols here,
24:51
Speaker 2: because we think this is uh, that's the whole point.
24:54
Speaker 2: We're trying to do this law so that we have
24:56
Speaker 2: clarity so that the US can be the leader as
24:59
Speaker 2: we entered this new era of financial technology.
25:04
Speaker 1: Listen, Senator Warren most likely is going to be the
25:06
Speaker 1: brick wall coming into that, you know, Senate vote who
25:12
Speaker 1: would be because every time I've seen her go head
25:16
Speaker 1: to head with anyone, whether it's Republican or Democrat, doesn't matter.
25:20
Speaker 1: She does a pretty good job at positioning her facts,
25:24
Speaker 1: even though sometimes I don't think the facts are fully disclosed.
25:27
Speaker 1: And we just called that out yesterday in one of
25:30
Speaker 1: our shows. Who could challenge Senator Warren to try to
25:34
Speaker 1: get her on the right side of history here?
25:37
Speaker 2: She won't. She's like, she's just not gonna happen. Yeah,
25:40
Speaker 2: we've been you know, before being at Slana Policy Institute,
25:43
Speaker 2: I was a CEO of the Blockchain Association for seven years.
25:47
Speaker 2: She is not on our side and will never be
25:50
Speaker 2: on our side. And there have been effort after effort,
25:56
Speaker 2: you know, former students trying to appeal to her, you know,
26:01
Speaker 2: people within the crypto industry who are very like minded
26:04
Speaker 2: politically trying to get out. You know, there have been
26:06
Speaker 2: more efforts to try to get Elizabeth Warren on our
26:09
Speaker 2: side because if you think of her, you know, many
26:13
Speaker 2: years ago, you sort of thought of her as being
26:15
Speaker 2: the one that wanted to challenge the big banks, that
26:17
Speaker 2: wanted to you know, democratize the finance like she had.
26:22
Speaker 2: She has a lot of values that you think would
26:24
Speaker 2: align with crypto. But it turns out at the end
26:27
Speaker 2: of the day, she just wants the government to have
26:29
Speaker 2: control over everything and all of the information, and she
26:34
Speaker 2: is not here to be constructive and so it is
26:37
Speaker 2: a lost cause. I think to get her on.
26:39
Speaker 1: Board there you go, So fight to the end. Guys,
26:43
Speaker 1: last question to you, this obviously comes out of center.
26:46
Speaker 1: We're assuming that this is going to get passed through
26:48
Speaker 1: the Senate. It goes to the House, would this be
26:51
Speaker 1: pretty much a slam dunk over there, similar to fit
26:54
Speaker 1: twenty one vote, which yeah, I.
26:56
Speaker 2: Think, I think so, I think, And when the how
27:00
Speaker 2: past their version of clarity, it was a very bipartisan
27:03
Speaker 2: this year as well. And listen, it is so difficult
27:06
Speaker 2: to get something through the Senate floor that whatever the
27:10
Speaker 2: Senate can get the sixty plus votes to send over
27:13
Speaker 2: to the House, I think the House will probably just
27:16
Speaker 2: pass that obviously, as you will know, to get to
27:18
Speaker 2: the President's desk you have to have identical language approved
27:21
Speaker 2: in the House in the Senate, and so I think
27:23
Speaker 2: it'll very quickly move through the House and then you know,
27:26
Speaker 2: hopefully we can be headed back to the White House
27:28
Speaker 2: for another bill sending ceremony this summer.
27:30
Speaker 1: Wouldn't that be something?
27:31
Speaker 2: It would be amazing, It would be really historian.
27:34
Speaker 1: We haven't seen much like this in thirty years since
27:37
Speaker 1: really the birth of the internet. So Kristin Smith, President
27:41
Speaker 1: at the Salona Policy Institute, thank you so much for
27:43
Speaker 1: coming in today.
27:44
Speaker 2: We appreciate it all right, Thanks for having me, Paul.
27:53
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