CLARITY Act is dangerous! The White House takes action to unbundle the encryption part of the "Credit Card Surcharge Amendment"

U.S. Senator Roger Marshall temporarily backs down, abandoning his attempt to insert credit card swipe fee reform into the critical “Crypto Asset Regulation” bill. This move temporarily eases the legislative showdown that could have escalated into a full-scale conflict between “Financial Industry vs. Retail Industry,” and also provides an opportunity to advance the White House’s favored Crypto CLARITY Act.
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According to POLITICO, U.S. Kansas Republican Senator Roger Marshall, after private negotiations, agreed not to propose an amendment targeting credit card swipe fees during the Senate Agriculture Committee’s review of the cryptocurrency bill this Thursday. This decision effectively removes a political variable from the highly anticipated Digital Asset Market CLARITY Act.

Last week, Marshall formally submitted a draft amendment to the committee, which calls for introducing more competition mechanisms in online payment swipe fees—similar to his long-standing efforts with Illinois Democratic Senator Dick Durbin on the Credit Card Competition Act. This version also gained support from Durbin and Vermont Democratic Senator Peter Welch.

Payment vs. Retail = Finance vs. Crypto

On the surface, Marshall’s amendment focuses on “swipe fees,” targeting the interests of payment networks like Visa and Mastercard, along with large banks and acquirers. However, by tying this issue to the “Crypto Market Structure” bill, he’s adding a grenade to an already complex regulatory negotiation table.

The crypto legislation overseen by the Senate Agriculture Committee is seen as one of the few short-term opportunities for the U.S. to establish a digital asset regulatory framework, defining how digital assets are classified, which agency oversees them, and what rules trading platforms must follow. For financial markets, this relates to how traditional capital and the crypto industry will connect in the future, and influences funding strategies on Wall Street, Silicon Valley, and among crypto startups.

The problem is, the swipe fee issue is highly polarized: financial institutions emphasize payment and investment security, risk management, and infrastructure, requiring stable rates; large retailers have long complained about high fees eating into margins and squeezing end prices.

If this issue is attached to the crypto bill, it essentially brings the long-standing “Finance vs. Retail” tug-of-war onto a legislative battlefield already rife with disagreements.

Reports indicate that some Republican senators who were initially inclined to support the crypto market structure bill are now hesitant or opposed to the credit card reform. If Marshall insists on proposing the amendment during the hearing, he may force these senators to vote on both “crypto regulation” and “fee reform” in a single vote, risking the bill’s passage in committee.

White House Steps In: Prioritize Passing the Crypto Bill

POLITICO cites unnamed sources indicating that White House officials have intervened. Insiders say that if Marshall insists on attaching the swipe fee amendment to the crypto bill in the Agriculture Committee, it could jeopardize the bill’s overall passage. The White House’s current clear stance is to see the crypto bill pass smoothly through the committee.

From the perspective of financial markets and the payments industry, this temporary retreat is not about rejecting swipe fee reform outright, but about preventing Congress from turning two highly sensitive conflicts into an unmanageable mess. Keep credit cards as credit cards, and crypto payments as crypto—otherwise, blocking the “cheap” crypto payments route could hinder widespread adoption.