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Sheila Warren, CEO of the Crypto Council for Innovation, joins Unchained to explore the dramatic shift by Democrats in the last few weeks on crypto. She explains why she believes the overturning of SAB 121 and the House vote for the FIT21 bill were both instrumental to the White House’s changing view on crypto and may have played a role in the SEC’s surprising approval of spot ETH ETFs.

Having worked for years on passing crypto legislation and as a lifelong Democrat, Sheila describes what kinds of arguments were persuasive to Democratic members of Congress, addresses some criticisms of the FIT21 bill, and gives her perspective on the debate about single-issue voters.

Show highlights:

  • The overall attitude toward crypto in Washington going into the House vote on SAB 121 on May 8
  • The bipartisan votes in the House and Senate to overturn SAB 121
  • Why, by the time of the Senate vote on FIT21, the White House had had a change of heart about crypto
  • Why, after the Senate vote to repeal SAB 121, the SEC approved the spot ETH ETFs
  • Why Sheila is so proud of the passage in the House of the FIT21 bill
  • How Sheila and CCI approached their discussions with Democrats and what arguments they found effective
  • Whether the industry has survived the negative image of SBF and FTX
  • The sea change in the White House between the SAB 121 vote and the FIT21 vote
  • A high-level description of the FIT21 bill 
  • What kind of authority the bill would give the CFTC over crypto 
  • What the implications of the bill are for launching tokens
  • FIT21’s approach to regulating DeFi and how the FIT21 bill is “kicking the can” on this topic
  • The overall political and legislation landscape and the next likely steps for crypto
  • Whether the ETF approval changes anything about the SEC’s investigation into Ethereum
  • What Sheila thinks about the ‘crypto single-issue voter’ debate 

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EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Guest:

Links

SAB 121

FIT21

Spot Ether ETFs

Ethereum Foundation investigation