CLARITY Act — Senate Floor Vote Tracker

CONFIRMED ACTIONS

The whip count table below reflects known signals — see methodology note preceding that table.

1. July 4 target passed with no floor vote scheduled, no cloture motion filed. Confirmed non-event — the White House's informal signing target expired without action.
   
2. Senate adjourned June 25 via unanimous consent for 19 days (confirmed by Thune securing UC to adjourn). Senate returned July 13 as scheduled — no change to that date.
   
3. Confirmed action: Trump Media & Technology Group withdrew Form S-1 registration statements for three Truth Social-branded crypto ETFs (Bitcoin ETF, Bitcoin & Ethereum ETF, Crypto Blue Chip ETF), sponsored by Yorkville America Digital, on May 19, 2026 — five calendar days (three business days) after the Senate Banking Committee's May 14 markup, where the bill advanced 15-9 and the Van Hollen ethics amendment (barring senior officials from holding crypto business interests) failed 11-13. No stated reason for the withdrawal is treated as established fact here, ours or any other party's.
   

Interpretation — Mark Berube, President, Quantum Capital: a political compromise generally requires a shared goal, good-faith trust between the parties, room to move (something each side can trade), a face-saving narrative, a forcing mechanism, durable institutions to carry the deal, and private negotiating space away from the floor. The Trump Media ETF withdrawal checks several of these boxes at once — it was executed through private negotiating space rather than a public floor fight, and it carried a ready-made face-saving narrative (the company's own stated rationale was a crowded, competitive ETF market, not a concession to Congress). The conditions exist amongst all parties to reach compromise on ethics.

4. Office of Government Ethics released Trump's 2025 financial disclosure July 1: ~$1.4B in crypto-related income ($635M TRUMP memecoin licensing, $500M+ WLFI token sales, plus additional holdings). Gillibrand publicly intensified her ethics demand in direct response, extending her ask to cover officials' spouses and meme coin issuance specifically.
   
5. Section 604 (Blockchain Regulatory Certainty Act) dispute — partial thaw, two confirmed actions: (a) NOBLE (National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives) issued a July 1 letter to Thune and Schumer formally endorsing CLARITY — first major law enforcement endorsement. (b) Major County Sheriffs of America (MCSA), representing 130M+ people, issued a July 3 letter to Scott and Warren shifting from opposition to neutral on Section 604, while still requesting Section 309 amendments adding state/local law enforcement to Treasury DeFi studies. National Sheriffs' Association, FOP, and NDAA status not independently reconfirmed as moved — do not conflate with MCSA.
   
6. Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) sent a signed July 7 letter to Thune and Schumer urging Section 604 be preserved in any floor text. Logged as a primary source (a Democrat actively shaping, not attacking, the bill) — not a confirmed yes-vote signal on final passage.
   
7. NY Fed President John Williams, July 9 Q&A remarks (multiple wire sources): stablecoins are not a threat to bank deposits, are not displacing money market funds, are “more about payments as opposed to stores of value,” and the Fed's ample reserves framework can absorb stablecoin-driven shifts. A sitting Fed official's statement directly undercutting the banking lobby's core objection to CLARITY (the same objection Dimon raised publicly May 29).
   
8. National security/China framing has broadened beyond Witt's original statement to Sen. Lummis, Sen. Scott, Secretary Bessent (“standards are strategy”), and independent strategists (Wellington-Altus). Contested by Sen. Warren's parallel national-security counter-frame centered on AML/illicit-finance risk from Section 604 rather than standards-setting.
   
9. A new unified Senate Banking + Agriculture merged draft (reported 70+ pages added) was flagged as expected as soon as the week of July 13, per CoinDesk sourcing dated July 9, with the ethics position not yet solidified as of that date. It was released July 14. Confirmed: the merged draft omits any ethics provision. This is a material change from the prior posture of “ingredients present, mechanism unknown” — the mechanism chosen was omission, not compromise.
   
10. Gillibrand and Alsobrooks separately told colleagues July 14 there is no CLARITY Act without an ethics provision — confirmed statement, not a floor-vote commitment either direction.
    
11. Senate Majority Leader Thune has pledged a floor vote before the August recess. The week of July 20 is confirmed as under active discussion as the target, following NDAA occupying Senate floor time the week of July 13. No cloture motion has been filed as of this writing.
    
12. Trump met with Republican senators at the White House the week of July 16 to discuss ethics language. Confirmed meeting occurred; no confirmed outcome or text resulted from it as of this writing.

THE MATH

52 Republican yes votes (53 minus Rand Paul — philosophical no on any federal regulation) + 8 Democratic votes needed = 60 (filibuster/cloture threshold). VP Vance tiebreaker does NOT apply — cloture requires supermajority, not simple majority.

Confirmed committee-level Democratic yes votes: 2 (Gallego, Alsobrooks) — both explicitly conditional on ethics resolution, and that condition is now unmet in the released merged draft.

Confirmed formal Democratic opposition: 3 (Murphy, Van Hollen, Merkley) — new as of July 14, directly tied to the ethics omission.

In RED by analyst call or self-stated skepticism: 2 (Booker, Schiff) — see whip count table for the distinction between Schiff's self-stated skepticism and the analyst call applied to Booker. Total RED count: 5, plus the 2 Georgia removals and Rand Paul.

Identified “green” pool: 9 senators, read from GENIUS Act precedent and known public signals. The ethics omission is a headwind against converting this pool, not a tailwind.

Confirmed floor commitments beyond committee vote: None as of July 19.

THE WHIP COUNT

METHODOLOGY NOTE: A whip count is a logical read built from known signals — voting record, stated relationships, public commitments. It is not a verifiable fact; the floor vote itself is the only true verification. Gallego and Alsobrooks additionally carry a committee-level vote, which is the strongest signal in the table but still falls short of a floor commitment. Two senators in the RED section (Booker, Schiff) rest on judgment rather than a floor vote; each entry states plainly whether the basis is the senator's own reported statement or an analyst judgment call, so readers can weigh the two differently. This distinction — confirmed statement vs. analyst call — is maintained throughout this document and is the same standard applied to every entry in this table.

SECTION 604 (BRCA) — STATUS UPDATE

Confirmed Section 604 thaw record, current as of July 19:

• NOBLE (National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives) — formal endorsement, July 1 letter to Thune/Schumer. States CLARITY does not alter existing federal criminal authorities (money laundering, unlicensed money transmitting, conspiracy, aiding/abetting, sanctions enforcement).
• Major County Sheriffs of America (MCSA) — shifted opposition to neutral, July 3 letter to Scott/Warren. Represents 113 sheriffs' offices, 130M+ people. Did NOT endorse; still requests a Section 309 amendment adding state/local law enforcement to Treasury DeFi study and advisory bodies.
• National Sheriffs' Association, Fraternal Order of Police, National District Attorneys Association — status NOT independently reconfirmed as moved. A letter from the National District Attorneys' Association referenced in press coverage this week argues Section 604 would materially impair criminal investigations — logged as continued opposition, not a new development.
• Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) — July 7 letter to Thune/Schumer urging Section 604 be preserved as-is. Primary source (signed letterhead); not a confirmed floor-vote signal.

THE ETHICS GATE — MERGED DRAFT OMITS THE PROVISION; COALITION FRACTURES

Editorial stance (locked): we do not predict outcomes. What changed this week is factual, not interpretive — the merged draft's mechanism for handling ethics is confirmed (omission), and three Democratic senators' response to that mechanism is confirmed (formal opposition). What remains unknown is whether a further amendment process on the floor reinserts ethics language, and whether that would hold the Gallego/Alsobrooks/Gillibrand bloc without re-triggering a White House veto threat.

Confirmed ingredients, updated:

• White House position (Witt, on record, Consensus Miami, unchanged): rules should apply “across the board, from the president all the way down to the brand new intern” — while explicitly rejecting anything “specifically targeting the president.”
• Two committee-confirmed conditional Democratic yes votes (Gallego, Alsobrooks) whose stated condition — ethics resolution — is now confirmed unmet in the merged draft's current form.
• Three confirmed Democratic no votes as of July 14 (Murphy, Van Hollen, Merkley), directly attributable to the same omission.
• Gillibrand's specific, stated ask unchanged: enforceable language barring officials (and their spouses) from issuing, sponsoring, or profiting from digital assets, including meme coins. Restated July 14 as a hard condition, not softened.
• A confirmed White House meeting with Republican senators the week of July 16 to discuss ethics language — outcome not yet confirmed.

KEY PRIMARY SOURCE QUOTES

Patrick Witt — White House Crypto Council, Consensus Miami

“Across the board, from the president all the way down to the brand new intern on Capitol Hill.” (Position: accepts uniform rules, rejects president-specific language.)

Sen. Chris Murphy — press conference, July 14, 2026

Stated there is no reason to adopt a new crypto regulatory system if it does not stop the President's conduct in the industry — paraphrased from multiple wire reports of the press conference; exact wording varies slightly by outlet.

Sen. Chris Van Hollen — press conference, July 14, 2026

Stated the President earned roughly $600 million in memecoin royalties while, by his account, close to a million investors lost an estimated $3.8 billion in the same token's collapse (per blockchain analytics data cited in reporting — not independently verified by us).

Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand — statement, July 14, 2026

Reaffirmed that public officials and their spouses should not be issuing meme coins, framing it as a commonsense, broadly bipartisan-supportable requirement — consistent with her July 1 post-disclosure statement, restated the day the merged draft omitted the provision.

NY Fed President John Williams — July 9, 2026 Q&A

Stated stablecoins are not a threat to bank deposits, are not displacing money market funds, and are more about payments than stores of value; said the Fed's ample-reserves framework can absorb stablecoin-driven shifts. (Multiple wire sources, FinancialJuice/ForexLive.)

NATIONAL SECURITY FRAME — MULTI-SOURCE CONFIRMATION

The China/standards-setting frame, first raised by White House Crypto Council's Patrick Witt, has broadened to multiple independent voices:

• Sen. Cynthia Lummis — China could write the rules of the new financial era if Congress fails to act; frames CLARITY as successor to the dollar-dominated system built over the last century.
• Sen. Tim Scott, Banking Committee Chairman (June 11, Fox Business) — tied CLARITY to dollar dominance directly, explicit parallel to the AI/China competitiveness argument.
• Secretary Bessent — “standards are strategy” (per reporting).
• James E. Thorne, Chief Market Strategist, Wellington-Altus Private Wealth (independent, June 27) — historical-precedent argument: transistor technology transfer post-WWII, offshored semiconductor manufacturing as prior instances of the U.S. ceding a strategic standard-setting position.

CONTESTED — not a uniform frame: Sen. Warren runs a parallel national-security argument pointed the opposite direction, arguing weakened Section 604/AML provisions would ease sanctions evasion, money laundering, and terrorist financing — also framed explicitly as a national security risk, and has separately demanded hearings on the national-security implications of Trump's crypto holdings before any floor vote. Two distinct national-security arguments are being aimed at two different provisions (standards-setting vs. illicit-finance safeguards). Keep this distinction explicit in any client-facing framing.

CALENDAR — UPDATED

HONEST POSITION — JULY 19, 2026

HONEST CALL

Before August recess remains the only viable legislative window, supported by the confirmed calendar. The week of July 20 is confirmed as the active target per Thune's pledge. Section 604 remains thawed on confirmed actions.

This report lays out HOW the CLARITY Act passes. I have written extensively elsewhere on WHY it should: “It's very necessary to bring U.S. best practices onshore, and we work tirelessly in terms of custodying these assets and making the U.S. the innovation capital of the world,” and “I look forward to the CLARITY Act being passed this summer.” — Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, testifying before the Senate Finance Committee, June 4, 2026.

Unfortunately, I don't know when the CLARITY Act becomes law.

DISCLOSURE

This communication is produced by Quantum Capital, a brand of Patriot Advisory Group LLC ("Patriot"), a state-registered investment adviser in the State of New Hampshire. Registration does not imply a certain level of skill or training. This material is intended solely for informational and educational purposes and does not constitute investment advice, a recommendation, a solicitation, or an offer to buy or sell any security, digital asset, or other financial instrument. The information contained herein reflects the views of the author as of the date of publication and is subject to change without notice. Digital assets including Ethereum and related instruments are speculative, highly volatile, and may result in the total loss of invested capital. Past performance is not indicative of future results. Nothing in this communication should be construed as legal, tax, accounting, or regulatory advice. Readers should conduct their own due diligence and consult with qualified legal, tax, and financial professionals before making any investment decision.

The legislative whip count in this document is an analytical estimate built from public voting records, public statements, and stated relationships. It is not a prediction, is not investment advice, and is not a statement of fact about how any senator will ultimately vote. Where an entry reflects the author's judgment rather than a senator's own public statement, this document labels it as such. The only true verification of any senator's position is the recorded floor vote itself.