Crypto▼ Bearish
House Crypto-Ban Fight Splits Lawmakers as Stock Trade Bill Advances
A House bill to ban lawmakers from trading stocks stalls on whether to include crypto. Spanberger says yes, Roy says no. STOCK Act enforcement is weak.
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The US House of Representatives is pushing a bill to ban lawmakers from owning or trading individual stocks. The unresolved question: should digital assets count?
The Restore Trust in Congress Act, introduced in September 2025 with more than 80 co-sponsors, would bar members, their spouses, and their dependents from holding or trading company shares. According to Politico and the Harvard Journal on Legislation, the biggest sticking point is whether Bitcoin and Ethereum should be treated the same as stocks.
Congresswoman Abigail Spanberger (D-Va.) said they should. Lawmakers can influence crypto prices through legislation, she argued, so the same conflict-of-interest rules should apply. Congressman Chip Roy (R-Texas) pushed back, calling digital currencies “a little different” and saying legislators should still be allowed to hold them as an inflation hedge.
Crypto political contributions totaled $119 million in the 2024 election cycle, according to the Campaign Legal Center. Politico’s estimate put the figure above $160 million. Ten sitting members of Congress hold between $750,000 and $2 million in crypto assets, the same group estimated.
Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-Ga.) has taken a hard line. Members should not buy or sell crypto while writing legislation that affects it, he said. Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.), a prominent crypto advocate, said she voluntarily placed her own digital-asset holdings in a blind trust but opposes making that mandatory for all lawmakers. A blanket requirement, she argued, would disproportionately burden members with fewer financial resources.