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Points of Focus
- Susan Collins, Josh Hawley and Jerry Moran broke with GOP leaders in the 49-50 CLARITY Act cloture vote.
- All three had raised concerns that stablecoin rewards could drain bank deposits.
- An 18-month Treasury circuit breaker failed to win over eight banking groups.
Three Senate Republicans who had raised concerns about stablecoin rewards broke with party leadership Tuesday as the CLARITY Act failed its first full-Senate test. With 53 Republican seats, GOP leaders needed at least seven Democratic or independent votes even with full Republican support.
Susan Collins, Josh Hawley and Jerry Moran opposed cloture on Sept. 15 as the motion failed 49-50, short of the 60 votes required to advance. The official Senate record shows a fourth Republican Nay from Thom Tillis, but the Senate floor log said Tillis voted no so he could move to reconsider the failed vote.
CLARITY Act stablecoin fight splits Republican support
The banking dispute had been building before the vote. An Aug. 8 Bank Policy Institute brief, citing Politico reporting, listed Collins, Hawley and Moran among seven Republican senators who had raised concerns that stablecoin rewards could drive deposit flight.
Republicans tried to address those concerns in the final draft. The text gave the Treasury secretary power to impose an 18-month “circuit breaker” on stablecoin rewards if payment stablecoins caused substantial deposit outflows from community banks.
Eight banking groups still objected, arguing the tool would activate only after significant deposit flight had occurred. Reuters reported on Sept. 14 that the banking industry remained opposed.
White House challenges stablecoin deposit fears
The White House disputes the scale of that risk. Council of Economic Advisers research published April 8 estimated that banning stablecoin yield would increase bank lending by $2.1 billion in its baseline model, or 0.02%, while creating an $800 million net welfare cost.
Even after stacking its worst-case assumptions, the model put the increase in bank lending at 4.4%, assumptions the CEA described as implausible.
Crypto companies have been offering rewards on stablecoins for years. We don’t need to speculate: If the deposit flight myth were real, it would have already occurred. Instead, data shows bank deposits are going up, not down.
Still, the compromise contained in Section 404 of… https://t.co/uHVuLzJoVw
— Patrick Witt (@patrickjwitt) September 14, 2026
Alan Konevsky, CEO of tZERO, told AlphaWire the failed vote doesn’t halt the shift toward regulated digital asset markets, pointing to parallel SEC and CFTC rulemaking. He expects institutions to keep adopting tokenized market infrastructure while Congress debates a permanent framework.
Banking concerns were only one part of CLARITY’s defeat. Democrats also objected to the bill’s ethics and illicit-finance safeguards, despite Republicans saying the final text incorporated 126 substantive changes requested by Democrats. The Senate recorded 49 Yeas, 50 Nays and one senator not voting. At 3:01 p.m., Tillis moved to reconsider H.R. 3633.
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