A Blockchain Association letter signed by ex-CIA, DOJ, Treasury, FBI, IRS-CI, Secret Service and military officials lands on Thune and Schumer the same day the Senate restarts crypto market-structure negotiations.
A coalition of 160 former U.S. national-security, intelligence and law-enforcement officials urged the Senate on Tuesday to pass the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act, casting the bill as a national-security upgrade rather than an industry favor.
The letter, organized by the Blockchain Association, Washington’s largest crypto trade group, was sent to Senate Majority Leader John Thune and Minority Leader Charles Schumer on the same day the chamber resumed CLARITY Act negotiations.
Signatories include Faryar Shirzad, a former White House deputy national security advisor for international economics under President George W. Bush and now Coinbase’s chief policy officer; Yaya Fanusie, a former CIA analyst; James Lee, who ran IRS Criminal Investigation until 2024; Michele Korver, FinCEN’s former chief digital currency advisor and a former DOJ digital currency counsel; and Jai Ramaswamy, a former chief of DOJ’s Asset Forfeiture and Money Laundering Section. The remainder of the 160 names span retired Secret Service agents, FBI field-office investigators, military veterans and state and local police.
The intervention reframes a market-structure bill that critics, including Senate Banking ranking member Elizabeth Warren, have labeled a national-security risk. The signatories argue the opposite: that leaving roughly $2.39 trillion of crypto market value, according to CoinGecko, to migrate offshore is the bigger risk to U.S. investigators. Bitcoin alone accounts for 56% of that total.
Modern Federal Framework
“As former national security, intelligence, and law enforcement officials, we write in support of advancing the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act and establishing a modern federal framework in the United States for digital asset oversight, counter-illicit finance efforts, and cybersecurity coordination,” the letter reads.
The signatories tied the bill to specific enforcement upgrades rather than to deregulation. They highlighted that CLARITY would extend Bank Secrecy Act and sanctions-compliance obligations to digital-commodity brokers, dealers and exchanges (Section 201); set up a Treasury-led information-sharing pilot involving DOJ, FBI and DEA (Section 203); establish a permanent interagency working group on crypto illicit finance including IRS and Secret Service (Section 204); extend Section 311 special-measures authorities to digital assets (Section 303); and modernize seizure and forfeiture authorities by defining digital assets as monetary instruments (Section 307).
“These are not deregulatory measures,” the letter says. “They are enhanced enforcement tools designed to improve visibility, coordination, compliance, and accountability across digital asset markets.”
Same-Day Senate Hook
The letter landed as the Senate restarted CLARITY negotiations after Memorial Day recess. The bill cleared the Senate Banking Committee 15-9 on May 14 and was placed on the legislative calendar shortly after, with leadership now working to merge the Banking text with the Agriculture Committee’s version before any floor vote.
The Blockchain Association also said it is preparing meetings across 18 Senate offices this week and will host a Thursday virtual town hall on the bill’s law-enforcement and national-security implications, with Sen. Cynthia Lummis, House Majority Whip Tom Emmer, and White House digital assets adviser Patrick Witt as scheduled participants.
What Could Still Stall the Bill
Ethics restrictions on elected officials holding crypto remain unresolved, with Democrats threatening to withhold votes unless language tightening rules around officeholders’ digital-asset interests is added — a fight sharpened by President Donald Trump’s family token ventures. The stablecoin-yield compromise brokered in committee, which barred bank-deposit-equivalent yield while allowing spend-based rewards, also remains contested in the conference between the Banking and Agriculture committee texts.
Floor passage still requires 60 votes, meaning at least seven Democratic crossovers in addition to all 53 Republicans, and the merged text needs to pass both chambers before reaching Trump’s desk. Patrick Witt’s working timeline pencils in four Senate weeks in June for floor action — a window that gives Tuesday’s letter, and the Blockchain Association’s 18-office fly-in, a narrow runway to move undecided Democrats before the July 4 marker.
