Senator Moreno Issues End-of-May Deadline for the CLARITY Act or It Could Be Shelved for Years

Senator Bernie Moreno declared at a Washington event on April 22 that the CLARITY Act must clear Congress by the end of May, stating plainly that missing that deadline could shelve the legislation indefinitely as midterm election politics consume the remainder of the congressional calendar.

Senator Bernie Moreno told attendees at a Washington event on April 22 that the CLARITY Act will get done by the end of May, and that failure to hit that window risks shelving the legislation indefinitely. “I think we’re going to get it done by the end of May,” Moreno said, according to Disruption Banking. His statement pushed Polymarket odds of the CLARITY Act passing in 2026 from 38% to 46%, though the prediction market remains far from confident.

Senator Moreno CLARITY Act Deadline Sets the Stakes for the Crypto Industry

Moreno also dismissed the stablecoin yield opposition from banking groups as noise. “There’s a lot of noise in the market, but most of it is fake,” he said, adding that banks need to innovate rather than block legislation. The comment came as the North Carolina Bankers Association was actively urging member banks to call Senator Thom Tillis’s office and demand changes to the stablecoin yield compromise that had already been negotiated with the crypto industry. As crypto.news reported, banking groups including the American Bankers Association have warned that allowing stablecoin rewards could drain up to $6.6 trillion in deposits from the banking system, a position the White House Council of Economic Advisers directly contradicted by calculating the lending impact of a yield ban at just 0.02%. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has also warned publicly that regulatory delay pushes digital asset innovation toward Dubai and Singapore.

Why the May Window Is the Only Real Window Left

Congress breaks for Memorial Day recess on May 21, leaving fewer than four weeks of operational legislative time after Moreno’s April 22 statement. As crypto.news has tracked, even after a successful Banking Committee markup, the bill requires a 60-vote Senate floor threshold, reconciliation between the Senate Agriculture Committee and Banking Committee versions, reconciliation with the House-passed text from July 2025, and a presidential signature. That is four sequential steps after the markup, each a potential delay point. Galaxy Research analyst Alex Thorn noted that only approximately 18 working weeks remain before the October midterm recess, meaning every week of Senate inaction now shrinks the floor consideration window to the point where 2026 passage becomes structurally implausible without Banking Committee clearance this month.

Galaxy Research Puts Passage Odds at 50-50

As crypto.news documented, Galaxy Research has assessed the odds of the CLARITY Act being signed into law in 2026 at roughly 50-50, and possibly lower. “The uncertainty stems not from any single issue but from the sheer number of unresolved questions that must be settled in sequence under severe time pressure,” Galaxy said in a research note circulating this week. Senator Cynthia Lummis has gone further than Moreno in framing the stakes, warning publicly that missing this window means waiting until at least 2030, when a new Congress would need to restart the entire legislative process from the beginning. The Senate Banking Committee has not announced a markup date as of publication.

A lame duck session of Congress after the November elections has been floated by some industry insiders as a last-ditch fallback option if the May window closes, though Galaxy Research describes that scenario as low probability.