1. United States
2. N.C.
3. Letter

I am writing to urge you to vote no when the CLARITY Act comes up for a procedural vote on September 15. As your constituent, and someone with investments in retirement accounts that will be at risk if the current act is approved, I ask you to oppose any market structure legislation that does not protect crypto investors at least as well as the SEC protects investors in publicly traded stocks. The Senate revision may add useful registration, disclosure, custody, and anti-fraud provisions, but its exemptions, especially for decentralized finance and software-related activity, remain too broad. They risk creating loopholes that will swallow the regulation. Companies and operators should not be able to avoid responsibility simply by describing themselves as software developers, protocol participants, or decentralized platforms while controlling access, profiting from transactions, or exercising meaningful influence over customers’ assets. Before any market structure legislation is acceptable, it should include a narrow DeFi safe harbor that only protects genuine software development without shielding commercial operators from investor-protection obligations. It should establish clear customer ownership and bankruptcy rules, prohibit unauthorized lending or rehypothecation of customer assets, and provide meaningful compensation when assets are lost through insolvency, theft, or platform failure. It should impose stablecoin requirements that prevent rewards programs from functioning as uninsured interest-bearing deposits. It should preserve state authority to enforce stronger consumer protections and provide the SEC and CFTC with sufficient resources to supervise these markets effectively. Investors also need equivalent disclosure requirements, clear remedies, and a regulatory framework that does not shift products into a less protective regime merely by labeling them digital commodities or ancillary assets. Crypto investors should not receive weaker safeguards simply because the underlying technology is new. Finally, the current ethics language is inadequate. It would not sufficiently prevent senior legislative and executive branch officials, their families, or their business associates from profiting from crypto ventures while influencing crypto policy, enforcement, or regulation. Recent experience has already shown the danger of officials using public prominence and political influence to promote speculative assets and potentially benefit from resulting price surges. At a minimum, the bill needs comprehensive conflict-of-interest rules, broad disclosure requirements, strong enforcement, meaningful penalties, and no temporary sunset that allows these protections to disappear. Please vote no on September 15 procedural vote to show your opposition to market structure bill that places crypto interests ahead of ordinary investors.