CLARITY Act’s September 15 Test Arrives as the SEC Opens Its Own Crypto Rulebook

The CLARITY Act cannot get out of its own way, and the Senate now has a fixed date to prove that wrong. Majority Leader John Thune filed cloture on August 8, setting up a procedural vote for September 15, the day the Senate returns from recess. That single date now carries the bill’s remaining momentum for the year.

Thune’s September 15 Vote and the Seven-Vote Math

The Digital Asset Market Clarity Act needs 60 votes to clear the Senate, and Republicans hold 53 seats. That leaves the bill needing at least seven Democratic votes. Thune told reporters Democrats “insisted on no vote” before the break, though he pointed to progress on ethics language with Senator Cynthia Lummis, calling her work “great” and promising it would be “queued up first thing when we come back.”

Prediction markets have turned less confident. Galaxy Research cut its passage odds, most recently to 10% in mid-August, while Polymarket traders priced the bill’s chances at around 17%. Senator Elizabeth Warren has kept up her opposition, describing the bill as “written by the crypto industry to protect and advance the crypto industry.”

Alex Thorn of Galaxy Research laid out the firm’s revised outlook here:

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