Blockchain Association pushes Congress for crypto tax overhaul as Clarity Act stalls

What happened

The Blockchain Association sent a letter on Thursday to the four top congressional leaders, Senate Majority Leader John Thune, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, House Speaker Mike Johnson and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, urging passage of bipartisan digital asset tax legislation. Chief Policy Officer Lindsay Fraser signed it. The push is the group's first broad campaign on taxes since the Clarity Act failed in the Senate last month, and the association, which says it has more than 100 members, paired the letter with a new site, TaxClarityforAmerica.com, built to help constituents contact their representatives.

The letter sets out ten principles. They include a de minimis exemption for small transactions, cash treatment for qualifying stablecoins, taxing mining and staking rewards when they are sold rather than when received, and limiting broker reporting to firms that hold or control customer assets, which would leave non-custodial developers outside the regime. The group also wants wash sale rules extended to crypto, a safe harbor for foreign traders using U.S. exchanges, an optional mark-to-market election, no appraisal requirement for charitable gifts of widely traded tokens, and research and development credit eligibility for blockchain work. Moving coins between a holder's own wallets, including through smart contracts and bridges, should not trigger tax when ownership and exposure do not change, it said.

The letter argues that 67 million Americans hold or use digital assets while the rules governing them "were written for a different era." That figure is the association's own advocacy count, not a government tally. What the letter does not do is back a specific bill: two measures are in play, one in each chamber, and the association named neither.

Why it matters

With market structure legislation stuck, tax has become the industry's most plausible legislative target. The House tax package cleared committee with bipartisan votes, and its wash sale provisions raise revenue, giving tax writers a reason to attach the language to a larger moving vehicle. Punchbowl News reported that the association's refusal to endorse either bill signals the industry wants more than Congress has produced. Tax law would not, however, resolve the questions the Clarity Act was written to answer, such as how the SEC and CFTC divide authority over spot markets and intermediaries.

What the data shows

The House bill exempts network fees of $10 or less from gain or loss calculations, with a carve-out for taxpayers who made more than 5,000 transfers in the prior year, and exempts qualified dollar stablecoins from its wash sale rule. Sen. Steve Daines's ADAPT Act sets the same $10 fee threshold and covers purchases made with GENIUS Act stablecoins. Cynthia Lummis's earlier S. 2207, which proposes a $300 per-transaction exemption capped at $5,000 a year, has sat in the Finance Committee since June 2025. Neither chamber's text exempts small bitcoin purchases, a priority the industry promoted at Bitcoin 2026; the letter asks for a "meaningful" exemption without naming a number. Crypto.news reported that the House package scores as a net revenue gain of roughly $500 million, with relief for small fees costing more than the wash sale change raises.

Background

The Clarity Act passed the House 294-134 in July 2025, then stalled in the Senate for more than a year as the banking lobby fought the crypto industry over stablecoin yield and Democrats pressed for ethics language aimed at the Trump family's crypto ventures. A cloture vote on September 15 failed 49-50; no Democrat crossed over, and Republicans Susan Collins, Josh Hawley and Jerry Moran voted no. Thom Tillis switched his vote so he could file a motion to reconsider, which keeps the bill alive on paper and little more.

One day later, the Ways and Means Committee approved the Digital Asset Tax Certainty Act, H.R. 10357, a 114-page package from Chairman Jason Smith (R-MO), by 38-5. It dropped Rep. Mike Carey's mining and staking deferral measure, H.R. 9175, taxing validation rewards instead as ordinary income on receipt. Rep. Steven Horsford (D-NV), who had proposed capping deferral at five years, voted for the package and said the question remains open for further work. The Blockchain Association, Crypto Council for Innovation and Digital Chamber had asked the committee in June to pass Carey's bill without changes.

What is still unclear

Reports differ on the timing of the ADAPT Act: Bitcoin Magazine dates its introduction to September 30, while Crypto.news describes an October 22 announcement. It sits in committee either way. Whether either bill can move during a lame-duck session, and whether the Senate would accept the House's $10 fee threshold instead of a broader exemption, remains unresolved.

What to watch

Congress is in recess until after the November 3 midterms, leaving a lame-duck session measured in weeks in which crypto taxes will compete with government funding and whatever else leadership chooses to clear before the 119th Congress ends. Lummis, the Senate's loudest voice on digital asset taxes, retires in January 2027. Regulators continue to fill the gap meanwhile: the OCC issued its final GENIUS Act rule on Wednesday, and the SEC and CFTC have been setting policy through rulemaking and enforcement.

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