White House Digital Assets Advisory Council: 'Trump-Targeting Provision in Market-Structure Bill Unacceptable'

The White House Digital Assets (cryptocurrency) Advisory Council has pushed back strongly against ethics and anti-corruption provisions tied to President Donald Trump that are included in the digital-asset market-structure bill known as the CLARITY Act.

According to crypto-focused outlet CoinDesk on the 3rd (local time), Patrick Witt, executive director (head) of the White House Digital Assets Advisory Council, said in an interview that “the bill’s initial ethics provisions were completely absurd,” adding that “provisions that target the president personally or his family are absolutely unacceptable.”

He stressed that “there is a clear line we will not cross,” and that “legislation aimed at a specific individual is also inconsistent with the bill’s original purpose of clarifying market structure.”

He went on to say he “expects Democrats to present a more reasonable alternative that could lead to an agreement,” leaving room for further negotiations. However, he drew a firm line against approaches that directly restrict the president or his family.

Democrats are currently maintaining their position that the CLARITY Act should include ethics provisions restricting senior government officials and their families from holding and trading digital assets. They say the measures are intended to prevent conflicts of interest in the digital-asset policymaking process.

The CLARITY Act’s core aim is to clarify criteria for distinguishing between securities and commodities in digital assets, and to delineate supervisory authority between the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). However, as political disagreements over the ethics provisions have intensified, deliberations on the bill have run into headwinds.

In the market, some see the dispute as potentially affecting both the pace and direction of the bill’s progress as it moves through debates in the House and Senate.