Stablecoins Stay, CBDCs Don't: Senate Hands Housing Bill a 2030 Digital-Dollar Detour to Trump's Desk 🏠

The US House voted 358-32 on Tuesday to pass the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act, sending to President Donald Trump legislation that bars the Federal Reserve from issuing a central bank digital currency through Dec. 31, 2030. The Senate cleared the same bill 85-5 on Monday, and Trump is expected to sign it into law on Wednesday. The bill, which is largely aimed at boosting housing supply and lowering costs, now heads to the president after months of bicameral negotiations.

Tucked into the housing package is language stating the Fed "may not, directly or indirectly, issue or create a central bank digital currency or any digital asset that is substantially similar to a central bank digital currency." Even after the ban expires in 2030, the central bank would need explicit authorization from Congress to pursue a digital dollar. The provision carves out stablecoins, exempting any "dollar-denominated currency that is open, permissionless, and private," leaving issuers such as Circle and Tether, now governed by last year's GENIUS Act, untouched.

Senate Banking Committee Chair Tim Scott (R-SC), who wrote the bill with Ranking Member Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), said on the floor that "housing prices are too darn high and housing supply is too low." Warren called the package the most significant housing legislation in three decades and said it proved "that bipartisan legislation doesn't have to be the weakest, most milquetoast agreement." Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said it "shows Americans how we should govern." "Today, Congress delivered a major win for families working toward the American Dream," Scott said after the House vote. "I look forward to President Trump signing it into law."

The CBDC clause was added as a political sweetener to win over House Republicans and speed passage, reviving language from Rep. Tom Emmer's Anti-CBDC Surveillance State Act, which the House passed in July 2025 but stalled in the Senate. The Senate first attached a CBDC ban in March, passing that version 89-10, and reconciled text was released last week. There is no active federal effort to build a CBDC; the Fed never advanced beyond the research stage, and Chair Kevin Warsh and Trump have both publicly opposed a digital dollar. Trump signed an executive order in January 2025 directing his administration not to pursue one, and critics have cast CBDCs as tools of financial surveillance.

With the housing bill cleared, Congress is expected to turn to other priorities before the August recess and the November midterm elections, including the Senate's crypto market structure bill, dubbed the CLARITY Act. Despite months of talks between lawmakers and crypto and banking lobbyists, the CLARITY Act still faces pushback, and Galaxy Digital this month lowered its estimate of Senate passage before year-end to 60% as the congressional calendar tightens. Elsewhere, according to the Atlantic Council, three countries have officially launched a CBDC, 41 are in the pilot phase, 33 are in development, and 40 are still researching, while Reuters reported on June 16 that China signed up 26 financial institutions to its digital yuan (e-CNY) cross-border payment platform.