U.S. Treasury Secretary Besent issued a public ultimatum to Senate Democrats: Vote on the *CLARITY Act* immediately, or the U.S. will hand over leadership of the crypto industry to overseas competitors. Besent made it clear: - The House passed the bill over a year ago; - The Senate Banking Committee and Agriculture Committee have both advanced their respective texts; - Republicans are ready with a version that can be submitted for a full Senate vote; - The only thing blocking the bill’s progress now is the Democrats’ unwillingness to provide the votes needed to initiate deliberations. He even directly called out Elizabeth Warren, accusing some Democratic senators of being afraid of the "anti-crypto army" she promised to build, and went so far as to mock Warren by calling her a "bespectacled squirrel." Besent defended two key points of contention: 1. The *CLARITY Act* is not about deregulation. The new version requires digital asset exchanges, brokers, and other intermediaries to comply with anti-money laundering, customer identification, suspicious transaction reporting, and sanctions compliance obligations, aligning their regulatory standards more closely with traditional financial institutions. 2. The *Blockchain Regulatory Certainty Act* does not protect money launderers but rather safeguards software developers and infrastructure builders who do not custody user assets. The core principle is: merely writing code or running non-custodial protocols should not automatically classify someone as a financial institution subject to the *Bank Secrecy Act*. Notably, the Fraternal Order of Police, which previously opposed related texts, has publicly endorsed the latest version. However, Democrats are not convinced by Besent’s arguments. Seven Democratic senators involved in negotiations stated that the current text still falls short in areas like elected officials’ ethics, consumer protection, illicit finance, conflicts of interest, and market integrity. So now, the real debate is no longer whether the U.S. needs a crypto market structure bill. The debate has shifted to: Is the U.S. willing to keep the entire industry in a regulatory gray area just to impose more restrictions? Senate Majority Leader John Thune has indicated that the bill may soon be brought to a vote. The Senate reconvenes on August 4, and recess begins on August 10, leaving only a few days for the *CLARITY Act*. Besent closed with one of Satoshi Nakamoto’s most famous quotes: “If you don’t believe it or don’t get it, I don’t have the time to try to convince you, sorry.”