Trump Crypto Income Disclosure Revives Push for CLARITY Act Ethics Rules

The disclosure that President Donald Trump earned hundreds of millions of dollars from cryptocurrency ventures has intensified calls to add ethics provisions to the CLARITY Act, the US market-structure bill for digital assets.

The Block reported on July 1 that Trump’s 927-page financial disclosure listed major income from crypto businesses, including World Liberty Financial, or WLFI, the decentralized finance project founded by his family.

Congress is debating the CLARITY Act, which would establish the first comprehensive US regulatory framework for cryptocurrencies. As part of bipartisan negotiations, lawmakers are also discussing ethics language that would bar public officials, including the president, vice president and members of Congress, from privately profiting from crypto while in office.

Democrats renewed those calls after Trump’s disclosure became public. Senator Angela Alsobrooks said a bill with ethics rules applying to the president, vice president and all public officials was urgently needed. Americans should benefit from digital assets through a fair and honest system, she added, not through corruption or abuse of power.

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand said lawmakers are continuing to discuss a strong bipartisan ethics proposal that would prevent the president, vice president and members of Congress from personally profiting from cryptocurrency. No politician, including the president, should use public office for private gain, she said.

Senator Elizabeth Warren, a leading crypto critic, said the CLARITY Act should prevent not only the president, vice president and lawmakers, but also their family members, from profiting from the crypto industry. Otherwise, she said, it would further fuel what she called Trump’s crypto corruption.

Republicans have also signaled support for including an ethics provision. Senator Cynthia Lummis said the CLARITY Act would contain strong ethics rules to ensure that no elected official, regardless of party, could use their position to profit from digital assets. Lawmakers concerned about ethics and crypto should work together to pass the bill, she added.

Trump denied conflict-of-interest concerns related to the disclosure. He said his assets are managed in a blind trust and that he is neither directly involved nor in contact with the managers.

The filing also included income earned by first lady Melania Trump from non-fungible token, or NFT, sales. It showed she made about $6 million from NFT sales last year.