SkyBridge Capital founder Anthony Scaramucci is defending Coinbase Global Inc. (NASDAQ:COIN) CEO Brian Armstrong after the CLARITY Act, a long-awaited crypto regulatory bill, failed to advance in the Senate this week.

In a late-night post on X, Scaramucci wrote: “No one worked harder to advance the Clarity Act than @brian_armstrong.” He called the bill’s collapse “typical Washington nonsense,” arguing that partisan rancor, not policy failure, sank a compromise bill he said “helped all Americans.”

He added that the ensuing “blame game” was “total nonsense.”

A bill years in the making stalls again

Scaramucci’s remarks followed the latest setback for the Digital Asset Market CLARITY Act, which would create the first federal framework dividing crypto oversight between the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. The bill passed the House 294-134 in July 2025 but has repeatedly stalled in the Senate, where it needs 60 votes to overcome a filibuster amid disputes over ethics provisions and stablecoin yield rules.

That backdrop set the stage for Scaramucci’s defense of Armstrong, who separately pushed back against reporting he said unfairly singled him out.

Armstrong disputes narrative

Armstrong, in a recent post on X, said The Wall Street Journal was preparing a story blaming him and Coinbase personally for the bill’s failure, accusing the paper of “regurgitating bank lobby talking points” instead of reporting fairly on his years of advocacy for crypto legislation.

He said he opposed an early January draft over unresolved issues involving decentralized finance, tokenization, CFTC authority and stablecoin rewards, problems he said were resolved in a revised draft roughly four months later. “The final draft of CLARITY that went to the Senate was great, and I strongly supported it,” Armstrong wrote, adding he would “continue showing up” for crypto customers regardless of the criticism.

What You Should Know

The Senate vote, which failed 49-50, marked a major setback for federal crypto market structure legislation and leaves regulatory jurisdiction over digital assets divided between the SEC and CFTC unresolved heading into the 2026 midterms.

Disclaimer: This content was partially produced with the help of AI tools and was reviewed and published by Benzinga editors.

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