Senators Presented the Final Version of the CLARITY Act With Ethics Amendments

• A group of senators has introduced the final draft of the CLARITY Act with 126 amendments.
• The document includes, among other things, ethics provisions.
• They explicitly prohibit the president, the vice president, and a number of other officials from holding a significant stake in a crypto business.
• The ban will cover not only token issuance, but also their promotion, as well as earning income from transactions involving the asset.

Senators Cynthia Lummis, John Boozman, and Tim Scott released the final version of the crypto market structure bill (the CLARITY Act) ahead of a procedural vote on September 15, 2026. A total of 126 amendments authored by Democrats were added to the document, including ethics-related ones. 

As a reminder, last week Lummis introduced the previous version of the bill. Despite the fact that it included more than 110 amendments, the document did not contain provisions banning officials from running a crypto business or receiving income from it. 

“President Trump voluntarily agreed to unprecedented ethics restrictions that set some of the strictest ethics standards in U.S. history for all federally elected officials, judges, and their spouses. This text is truly bipartisan and includes more than 120 provisions added at the request of Democrats,” Lummis said. 

According to her, voting against the initiative on September 15 means opposing reforms, voluntarily giving up U.S. leadership in crypto assets, and trying to leave ordinary Americans without protections in this market. 

Changes to the Bill 

The document itself grew from 630 to 635 pages. In addition to changes related to DeFi and a number of other points, the updated draft primarily includes ethics amendments from the package put forward by Senators Thom Tillis and Ruben Gallego. 

However, that is not all. The document also added the following provisions:

• The U.S. Treasury will be able to impose restrictions in the event of a significant outflow of deposits from small banks into stablecoins
• Miners, validators, and software developers will not need to register as financial intermediaries
• The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) significantly strengthened its oversight measures to prevent conflicts of interest between affiliated companies.

More on the Ethics Amendments

The document states that senior officials and top government leaders will be barred from retaining a significant stake in companies whose primary source of income is tied to issuing or promoting digital assets. The threshold for such a stake was lowered to $15,000. The assets will have to be sold or transferred into a blind trust.

The restrictions apply not only to issuing one’s own tokens, but also to paid promotion, name licensing, or earning income from related transactions. The rules will affect the sitting and president-elect, the vice president, members of Congress, federal judges, and their spouses.

State attorneys general will also receive a mechanism to oversee compliance with these requirements. At the same time, lawmakers tightened penalties. Instead of the previous 10% of the compensation received or $500,000, violators could face a fine of 20% or $500,000, depending on which amount is higher.

In addition, the final text removed the provision under which these restrictions would have automatically expired in January 2029. The new rules will become permanent unless Congress changes them separately.

As a reminder, the press previously reported that U.S. President Donald Trump had allegedly agreed to the ethics amendments. However, Gallego later denied this, noting that the White House is refusing to compromise. 

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