Ripple CEO Backs CLARITY Act as Senate Review Continues

Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent have both publicly backed the CLARITY Act, the market-structure bill now pending in the Senate after passing the House with a 294-134 vote. Their support emerged through separate statements months apart, and no primary-source evidence confirms Garlinghouse explicitly endorsed Bessent by name. The overlap is verified alignment on the same legislation, not a direct personal endorsement.

What to Know

• Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on July 31, 2025 that the next crypto policy priority is moving market-structure legislation through the Senate, specifically citing the CLARITY Act as bipartisan legislation for clearer digital-asset rules.
• H.R. 3633, the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act of 2025, passed the House on July 17, 2025 by a 294-134 vote and was referred to the Senate Banking Committee on September 18, 2025.
• Brad Garlinghouse separately backed the bill, arguing it could unlock U.S. bank participation and reportedly assigning an 80% probability of passage by end of April 2026. No primary-source statement was found in which he explicitly named Bessent.

What Garlinghouse and Bessent Actually Said

Bessent's position came first. In Treasury remarks published July 31, 2025, the secretary said the next legislative step for crypto is market-structure legislation through the Senate. He pointed to the House's CLARITY Act as the bipartisan vehicle for providing clearer rules to the digital-asset industry.

Garlinghouse's public support surfaced months later. In a March 27, 2026 FOX interview, the Ripple CEO argued the CLARITY Act would unlock U.S. bank participation in digital assets.

CLARITY Act would "unlock" U.S. bank participation.

Brad Garlinghouse, FOX interview, March 27, 2026

A Yahoo Finance-hosted Investing.com report added a timeline to that optimism, saying Garlinghouse put an 80% probability on the bill passing by end of April 2026. That is a concrete, near-term deadline that markets can price against.

The chronology matters. Bessent spoke in July 2025; Garlinghouse's statements landed in early 2026. Both support the same bill, but research found no primary-source statement where Garlinghouse referenced Bessent by name. According to unconfirmed reports, some coverage framed the overlap as a direct endorsement, but the verified record shows parallel support rather than a coordinated public stance.

Where the CLARITY Act Stands After House Passage

H.R. 3633, formally the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act of 2025, cleared the House on July 17, 2025 with a 294-134 bipartisan vote. Nearly 70% of voting members supported it, an unusually broad margin for crypto-specific legislation.

The bill was received in the Senate on September 18, 2025 and referred to the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs. As of early April 2026, it remains in committee with no public floor vote scheduled.

The Congressional Research Service explains that the bill would give the CFTC a central role overseeing digital commodities while preserving parts of SEC authority over certain primary-market crypto transactions. In practical terms, this creates a federal framework splitting oversight between the two agencies, resolving jurisdictional ambiguity that has defined U.S. crypto regulation for years.

That split is the core policy question. The fight is no longer over whether Washington sees digital assets as material enough to regulate. It is over which regulator gets the larger operational role once rules are written, and how secondary-market commodity-style trading gets separated from token issuance that resembles securities activity.

Why This Matters for Ripple, XRP, and U.S. Crypto Markets

Garlinghouse's bank-participation argument gives the bill a direct Ripple angle. If U.S. banks gain a clearer federal lane for handling digital commodities, Ripple can argue more credibly for broader institutional use of its network and for a less ambiguous policy backdrop around XRP. The company spent years in SEC litigation over whether XRP constituted a security; legislation that formally divides CFTC and SEC jurisdiction could reduce the likelihood of similar enforcement actions.

For the broader industry, clearer market-structure rules address an operational bottleneck. Without defined regulatory categories, U.S. banks have largely avoided direct involvement in digital-asset custody, trading, and settlement. That same institutional caution extends to security concerns, as highlighted by a recently exposed Android vulnerability that put millions of crypto wallets at risk and Bitcoin Depot's $3.6 million loss from a cyberattack on settlement accounts.

XRP was trading at $1.34 with a market cap near $82.6 billion at press time. The token posted a 1.18% gain over 24 hours on volume of roughly $2.24 billion.

Those numbers sit against a cautious broader market. The Fear & Greed Index sat at 16, deep in "Extreme Fear" territory. The disconnect between a positive regulatory narrative and weak sentiment echoes patterns seen across crypto recently, where even XRP's unusual technical signals have struggled against macro headwinds.

The bill's path forward depends on the Senate Banking Committee. Garlinghouse's 80% confidence in passage by end of April 2026 sets a testable deadline. If the committee advances H.R. 3633 to a floor vote, it would mark the furthest any comprehensive U.S. crypto market-structure bill has progressed through Congress.

Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial or investment advice. Cryptocurrency and digital asset markets carry significant risk. Always do your own research before making decisions.