BlackRock and friends may soon control your digital wallet



America is on the edge of a financial cliff, and Washington’s so-called “solution” is yet another clever ploy that could further centralize power and lead to a reduction in freedom.

The latest scheme is a bipartisan bill dubbed the Genius Act. The U.S. Senate passed the bill on Tuesday by a vote of 68-30. The bill now moves on to the House, where its prospects are less clear.

It’s time for the right to sound the alarm and reject the Genius Act — at least until it offers protections for individual liberty.

Supporters of the law claim it will modernize digital finance by issuing new regulations for stablecoins, shoring up assets currently used by millions of people worldwide.

But the legislation comes with serious threats to liberty as well. It could ultimately become a backdoor way to create a digital dollar, one that offers minimal privacy protections and is easily controlled by massive institutions unaccountable to voters.

What is the Genius Act?

Officially named the “Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins Act,” the Genius Act aims to bring order and credibility to the booming stablecoin market.

Stablecoins are cryptocurrencies tied to supposedly “stable” assets like the U.S. dollar. USD Coin and Tether — two of the most widely used — circulate more than $200 billion combined.

The bill creates a regulatory framework for stablecoin issuers, allowing them to operate under either state or federal supervision. Lawmakers believe this approach will boost credibility with consumers and financial institutions.

The legislation also forces issuers to disclose their reserve assets, submit to public audits, and comply with the Bank Secrecy Act. That law requires financial entities to implement know-your-customer protocols and anti-money-laundering measures — rules that many stablecoin issuers currently avoid.

Most importantly, the Genius Act would force issuers to back their coins with liquid assets, such as U.S. dollars and Treasury securities. For example, for every USD Coin distributed, the issuer would need to maintain $1 in reserves or Treasury bills of equivalent value, ensuring that users can always exchange their stablecoins for dollars.

The Genius Act has drawn broad bipartisan support on Capitol Hill. Lawmakers from both parties praise its regulatory ambitions. But behind the applause lie serious risks.

Programmable money vs. financial freedom

The bill lays the foundation for a programmable digital currency system — one that lacks basic protections for privacy and liberty.

By granting stablecoins federal recognition and placing them under strict oversight and reserve rules, the Genius Act effectively turns them into government-blessed digital dollars, even if the federal government doesn’t issue them directly.

That might sound like progress — if the bill actually protected consumers. But it doesn’t.

The legislation includes no safeguards to prevent stablecoin issuers from linking usage to social credit systems, such as ESG scores, or restricting legal but politically disfavored transactions. These programmable currencies could easily reflect the ideological preferences of their creators.

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Photo by Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images

Want to donate to a political cause that a stablecoin company opposes? Expect a digital roadblock. Want to buy red meat, a gas-powered car, or anything else that fails to meet an ESG benchmark? Your money might simply stop working.

That’s not science fiction. That’s the likely outcome if Congress fails to add robust consumer protections to the Genius Act.

A forced hand

No one needs to use stablecoins — at least not yet. The Genius Act doesn’t eliminate traditional dollars. For now, consumers still have alternatives. But that could change quickly.

Stablecoins regulated by the U.S. government offer clear advantages over traditional currency. They move instantly, cost little or nothing to send, and operate around the clock. Because they’re digital, they require no physical infrastructure to create or distribute.

In nearly every respect, government-regulated stablecoins outperform paper money. Once the U.S. government legitimizes them and guarantees their safety, adoption will surge.

As usage grows, demand for traditional dollars could shrink. The companies issuing stablecoins would gain enormous control over economic life. Financial institutions could even begin phasing out physical currency, leaving those who resist digital money with no practical alternative.

That’s why Congress must include strong protections for individual liberty in any bill that accelerates stablecoin adoption. Without those safeguards, Americans may one day wake up to find their economic freedom coded out of existence.

A boon for Treasurys

One of the primary reasons so many in Washington support the Genius Act is that it would increase demand for Treasury bills, which helps the federal government finance its massive debt.

The Genius Act would require stablecoin issuers to back their currencies with cash or U.S. Treasurys. Of the two options, Treasury bills often make more sense for the companies issuing stablecoins. Why? Because Treasury bills pay interest.

Washington is drowning in red ink. With over $36 trillion in national debt and counting, the government desperately needs someone to keep buying its IOUs. Stablecoins could offer a trillion-dollar solution. By 2028, the Treasury Department estimates that stablecoin issuers could hold up to $1 trillion in Treasurys, so long as legislation like the Genius Act becomes law.

The Genius Act isn’t primarily about innovation. It’s about bailing out a bankrupt government.

Who’s pulling the strings?

Even more troubling is who stands to benefit. Major players behind these stablecoins include BlackRock, Fidelity, and other financial giants with deep ties to the globalist ESG agenda and organizations like the World Economic Forum. These aren’t neutral actors. They are ideological enforcers with an appetite for control.

Are these the people we want managing the digital currency of the future?

Are these the institutions we trust to safeguard our freedoms?

It’s time for the right to sound the alarm and reject the Genius Act — at least until it offers protections for individual liberty. If we do not act now, we may soon find ourselves in a nation where every transaction is tracked, every purchase scrutinized, and every dollar you “own” is merely rented from a system that can revoke your access with the flick of a switch.

Trump’s Bitcoin masterstroke puts America ahead in digital assets



With a single stroke of his Sharpie, President Donald Trump instantly made the United States into the world leader in digital assets, ensuring its dominance in the sector for the foreseeable future.The new Strategic Bitcoin Reserve and a U.S. Digital Asset Stockpile are a triple win for the American people.

Win No. 1: No cost to taxpayers

The reserve comes at no expense to taxpayers. Every asset within it was already owned by the federal government, including 200,000 Bitcoin — an amount that crypto czar David Sacks recently estimated to be worth about $17.5 billion. Moreover, the executive order establishing the reserve explicitly binds the government to “budget-neutral” strategies for acquiring additional Bitcoin and forbids the acquisition of other digital assets except through forfeiture proceedings.

The United States is poised to be the world leader in digital assets for many years to come.

In other words, the crypto reserve will be funded entirely by criminals and scammers like the ones who allegedly bilked several Massachusetts residents out of their savings through a fraudulent trading platform.

Win No. 2: Boosting domestic innovation

The crypto reserve will foster domestic innovation in an industry poised to be a major driver of economic growth well into the future. American digital assets companies, like Avalanche, already play a crucial role in this ecosystem, delivering high-paying jobs and contributing to the president’s broader economic agenda.

The crypto industry’s domestic investments will reinforce the principles of putting America first, creating American jobs, and driving economic growth that are at the heart of Trump’s plan to Make America Great Again.

Win No. 3: A global statement

By publicly staking America’s claim in digital assets, Trump and his crypto team led by crypto czar David Sacks and Bo Hines, executive director of the Presidential Council of Advisers for Digital Assets, are sending a strong signal to the global crypto community: America is open for business. For an industry that has faced widespread skepticism and even open hostility from establishment forces all over the world, this invitation will be enthusiastically embraced.

Instead of building data centers and other crypto infrastructure overseas, tech companies will invest hundreds of billions of dollars in the U.S. economy, creating new jobs and broadening our tax base.

The crypto industry has come a long way since a young programmer completed the first commercial Bitcoin transaction — exchanging 10,000 BTC for two Papa John’s pizzas. Today, those Bitcoins are worth just under $1 billion — an increase of roughly two billion percent in just 15 years.

Bitcoin’s value will soar

With Bitcoin’s circulation now capped, its value is projected to continue appreciating. Unlike the U.S. dollar, which inflationary policies can devalue, no entity can create additional BTC. Other digital assets have similar built-in safeguards, ensuring that they cannot be manipulated like fiat currencies.

In many ways, cryptocurrencies and other digital assets resemble gold, real estate, and other assets that serve as a stable, long-term store of value.

Sadly, this fact has not been appreciated by those in power until now.

“At one point in time, we had about 400,000 bitcoin on the federal balance sheet. We sold roughly half of that for something like $360 million total,” Sacks disclosed recently on an episode of the "All-In Podcast."

Although the premature sales cost American taxpayers around $17 billion at today’s prices, they serve to reinforce the benefits of creating a strategic reserve of these unique assets.

Throughout recorded history, governments worldwide have recognized the necessity of maintaining strategic gold reserves. These reserves can strengthen the domestic economy or provide strategic flexibility in international relations. The new crypto reserve will likely serve a similar function in the future.

As usual, Trump is several steps ahead of the political establishment. Thanks to his visionary leadership, the United States is poised to be the world leader in digital assets for many years to come.

Christians and Bitcoin: The new frontier of faith and technology



Enough time has elapsed since Bitcoin hit the landmark $100,000 value — and hovered around that point ever since — to make some recommendations to those who have kept their distance from the most important cryptocurrency in the world. Buckle up!

Of course, the disclaimer states that this is not financial advice. The twist is that what follows is, in a perhaps unexpected way, spiritual advice.

The most important thing to understand about Bitcoin is that it’s not just another measure or “store” of value.

But, of course, all Americans ought to see that America ceases to be America if it’s not America in cyberspace.

The entrenched financial elite want you to limit your interactions with and ideas about Bitcoin. For them, the ideal is adding Bitcoin to their pre-existing basket of financial assets and instruments — just another set of numbers on a spreadsheet that they can convince people to buy in to. Not only does this approach allow them to control your interactions with Bitcoin and your ideas about it, it also allows them to control YOU with Bitcoin.

That’s because Bitcoin truly is much more than “digital gold” — it’s a universal computational protocol that all but immutably preserves the information valued most by whoever uses it. And whoever uses it is determined not by casual choice but by “proof of work” — making the effort to expend energy on having a computer successfully compete to solve a math problem before others do.

What’s more, Bitcoin is a peer-to-peer currency. Those who merely hoard Bitcoin are, in that sense, misusing it. Bitcoin permits ordinary people to create markets and exchanges for goods and services without having to use the legacy financial system that has frustrated Americans so much over the past decades and enriched itself wildly in the process. Using Bitcoin in this way epitomizes the American way of commercial and cultural life.

Christians often recall the parable of the talents as one of Jesus’ most simple and powerful teachings. God gives us spiritual treasure and expects us to use it to make a spiritual profit, not just for ourselves but especially for one another. Those who bury their spiritual treasure out of fear that the Lord will be angry if we make a bad investment might be “rational” in their application of the precautionary principle, but they are failing to understand the economics of grace and salvation in a way that will lead them not to spiritual security but to spiritual ruin.

This is the way to understand Bitcoin. There’s nothing wrong with buying Bitcoin to participate in the re-founding of American financial and economic life on a footing appropriate to our technological development. It might even get you and your friends “rich” — or at least keep you in the game.

But if you stop there, it’s like burying your spiritual treasure and deluding yourself that you’ll be saved because you watch its ticker value trend up every day. Americans can only keep themselves American with regard to Bitcoin by treating Bitcoin the way Americans have traditionally and customarily treated their technology — confidently, competently, and constructively, in ways that mix the competitive and the collaborative into a dynamic and fruitful compound. Get Bitcoin and use it! Or else people, countries, ideologies, or cults that don’t like you very much are very likely to use it to control or even punish you.

That’s true for all Americans, but it goes double for American Christians. Christians choose willingly to become the servants of God — not of the world, where the rules favor those who do whatever it takes to get ahead and stay there. Amoral or immoral power obviously gravitates toward money as a lever for increasing pleasure and control.

Christians aren’t supposed to do that. On the contrary, they’re supposed to labor spiritually in the world on behalf of God and for his sake. Christians who refuse to bring this way of life to the realm of technology will find themselves on the losing end of the great spiritual war playing out in the visible and invisible worlds, the digital world very much included.

Yes, it can be confusing and tempting to venture outside one’s comfort zone into the murky and fast-moving world of tech. But Bitcoin is special. Although it’s one of the most potent technologies in the world, it’s not very difficult to understand or use, and it can be used right now to build enterprises that can strengthen our way of life, our form of government, and our humanity itself. On that all-important basis, the benefits of AI and other cutting-edge technologies just can't compare to Bitcoin's potential.

In fact, Bitcoin is so potent that it carries inherent danger — the danger of “eating the world,” as many say software has already done, and falling into the hands of a single amoral or immoral master or masters bent on perfecting a globalist system where Christ and God himself are seemingly disappeared from our past, present, and future. All the more reason why Christians will especially want to discipline Bitcoin like a well-trained beast of burden.

But of course, all Americans ought to see that America ceases to be America if it’s not America in cyberspace. That means Bitcoin must be more than just another technology dominated by the United States government. It must be bent toward our best purposes and away from our worst temptations — not by law, but by use, in what Alexis de Tocqueville memorably described as the reciprocal action of one heart upon the other.

The spiritual riches that result from this approach to Bitcoin are even better than the material riches caused by “number go up.” They’re good for America, good for you, and good for your fellow Americans. Try this — after you buy — and watch our country soar.

Your property rights could disappear in the ‘tokenized’ economy



Since January, blockchain technology company Digital Asset has issued at least eight press releases detailing its progress toward completing the Canton Network, a blockchain ledger designed to house tokenized assets. To run its Canton Network pilot programs, Digital Asset partnered with the Depository Trust and Clearing Corporation and Euroclear, two of the world’s most influential financial institutions.

These successful pilot programs indicate the imminent arrival of a global, dematerialized macroeconomic system, which could lead to the loss of remaining property rights over virtually all of our assets.

Are you ready to own nothing and be happy?

DTCC and Euroclear play critical roles in tokenization. DTCC serves as the clearing and settlement provider, standing “at the center of global trading activity” and processing trillions of dollars in securities transactions daily. Euroclear, meanwhile, is “the leading International Central Securities Depository (ICSD).” Together, these entities handle the majority of global securities transactions.

In the pilot program with DTCC, U.S. Treasuries were tokenized and used as collateral for margin calls. In the future, other tokenized assets could also serve as collateral for similar purposes and beyond.

Deloitte, which observed the Canton Network pilot programs, stated that tokenization aims to transform illiquid assets, create new assets usable like cash, open capital markets to more customers by making assets “cash-like,” and automate transactions. The Canton Network pilot programs demonstrated the feasibility of achieving all three objectives.

The organizations behind the Canton Network present it as a promising solution to address ownership and privacy concerns associated with other blockchain networks. While tokenization carries significant risks, it is not inherently problematic if properly designed and can even be beneficial.

However, the Canton Network’s processes for tokenization, custody, and control lack sufficient precision to guarantee that investors will retain their property rights. More concerning, Digital Asset states in a report that the Canton Network complies with Articles 8 and 12 of the Uniform Commercial Code, a comprehensive set of state laws governing commercial transactions in the United States.

In a paper I co-authored with Heartland Institute Research fellow Jack McPherrin, we discuss how the UCC has already undermined property rights to investment securities through the creation of a legal concept called a “security entitlement.” Revisions to Article 8 transformed individual securities investors from outright property owners into “entitlement holders,” allowing the world’s largest banks to seize what most consider personal property during insolvency scenarios.

As we emphasize in our paper, the proposed UCC Article 12 — along with amendments to Article 9 — threatens to extend this framework to all tokenized assets, further benefiting too-big-to-fail financial institutions at the expense of individual property rights.

In its report, Digital Asset asserts,

The creation of a digital twin of the UST fits neatly into [the Article 8] framework: the security interest in the underlying 'original' UST is perfected through Article 8 while the security interest in the controllable electronic record representing the UST is perfected by established control over the digital twin. However, the phrase 'digital twin' may end up creating confusion – market participants should consider simply explaining that these are securities entitlements represented by ledger entries on the blockchain.

In plain English, this means that tokenized assets will function in the exact same way as “security entitlements,” meaning that this technology will allow Digital Asset and its allies to legally own anything that is tokenized and housed on its blockchain.

As McPherrin and I explain, “UCC Article 8 defines individual securities investors as entitlement holders — with no property rights to the securities that investors think they own — the amendments to UCC Articles 9 and 12 would define individuals as purchasers of ‘interest,’ who are considered neither secured parties nor qualifying purchasers.”

We further clarify:

Under this new arrangement, ‘entitlement holders’ are treated as unsecured creditors rather than property owners. The ‘secured creditors’ are the too-big-to-fail financial institutions to which securities brokers have pledged investors’ assets as collateral for loans and derivatives. In other words, if a securities broker or the DTC/DTCC goes bankrupt, their creditors — primarily the world’s largest banks — have priority over the securities that investors believe they own.

As of October, 25 states and the District of Columbia have passed the 2022 amendments to the UCC that create Article 12 and update Article 9 for this centrally controlled, tokenized economy.

Why is this happening?

According to David Rogers Webb’s “The Great Taking,” the derivatives market needs more collateral to survive. Transforming currently illiquid assets into liquid forms of collateral solves this problem, while giving even greater control to the banks.

Once everything is tokenized, all assets will become collateral for the derivatives markets in which too-big-to-fail institutions are the secured creditors — and therefore the legal owners of all of our property.

It is no longer a matter of if all assets will be tokenized but when they will be tokenized. Are you ready to own nothing and be happy?

The feds are trying to stifle Bitcoin and crypto with draconian new regulations



Should regulations aimed at halting the financial activity of alleged criminals and terrorists be vastly expanded to include cryptocurrencies and firms that use them? Could this potentially harm entrepreneurial spirit and consumer freedom to deal in digital assets?

Those were the questions asked this week in Washington as officials from the Treasury Department seek new tools to regulate and track Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies that would impact theestimated 50 million Americans who use them.

On Tuesday, the Senate Banking Committee held anoversight hearing with Treasury Deputy Secretary Wally Adeyemo, who offered a series of rule changes to more strictly regulate the crypto activities of alleged criminals.

Thethree main proposals sought by the treasury would be to develop a sanctions protocol for foreign digital asset providers through the Office of Foreign Assets Control, expand existing money laundering rules that apply to U.S. crypto exchanges, and somehow gain authority to apply those same restrictions to foreign crypto exchanges beyond America’s shores.

Government officials justify these new powers by pointing to the reported cryptocurrency activities of groups like Hamas, whichwe reported were vastly overblown and technically inaccurate, and also several operations tied to gift cards and crypto exchange operations used by people sympathetic to Al Qaeda and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard.

Theselatter examples were successfully thwarted and stopped by the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security using existing law, and the on-chain activities of these groups and thealleged money launderers who operated in Turkey were enough to secure criminal indictments.

While there is no question that our governments should pursue terrorist activity and financing, there is little evidence that vastly expanded powers against crypto providers would increase enforcement or catch more bad actors. Especially when the vast majority of illicit financing of criminal activities still uses the traditional financial system and U.S. dollars, as the treasuryadmitted itself.

In response to the Treasury Department’s requests, a new bill called the ENFORCE Act is being floated to expand existing money laundering rules into the crypto sector even more harshly than it is applied to traditional fiat currencies.

It would apply to cryptocurrency custodians, money transmitters, and exchanges but would thankfully exempt any services that provide only non-custodial and peer-to-peer services.

Theproposed draft, authored by Sens. Thom Tillis (R-NC) and Bill Hagerty (R-TN), would require digital asset institutions to maintain robust anti-money laundering programs to ensure compliance with security measures and verify all customer information.

It would also require filing Suspicious Activity Reports with the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network for any “suspicious transaction that it believes is relevant to the possible violation of any law or regulation,” beginning at $2,000. This overly broad definition extends to any crypto transactions that “serve no business or apparent lawful purpose” as determined by any crypto exchange, and they would be legally required to withhold information of this report from the customer.

While this bill is much less harsh thansimilar proposals from anti-crypto firebrand Sen. Elizabeth Warren, it would provide stricter rules and procedures for crypto companies than the traditional banking sector.

For the average American consumer and user of cryptocurrencies on custodial services, that means there would be more scrutiny and surveillance at a smaller threshold on Coinbase than Bank of America.

Rather than embracing the permissionless innovation that Bitcoin and its cryptocurrency offspring provide, these rules would force yet more financial surveillance and regulatory compliance on the next iteration of digital money, artificially choking the growth of this industry.

It would also cause even more Americans to be caught up in the dragnet of “de-banking” for crypto, as institutions would rather cut off customers’ access to their services rather than comply with the unreasonable requirement of Suspicious Activity Reports for transactions above a small threshold, as we already see in the traditional banking system.

Because these reports have no inherent justification or process, except for the broad situational processes outlined in the Bank Secrecy Act and the Anti-Money Laundering Act, many bank customers have had theiraccounts closed or suspended without due process. Many are likely to be minorities, the underbanked, andpolitically active or religious groups.

This measure, applied to cryptocurrencies at a laughable limit of $2,000 — whichexceeds the average rent paid in several states — demonstrates the government’s willingness to restrict crypto activity for law-abiding citizens not suspected of any formal crime.

Along with the mounting financial regulations that compel institutions to restrict access to Americans both at home and internationally, this bill means that citizens who wish to participate in the crypto sector risk being denied actively.

In pursuit of criminals and terrorists, legislators are expanding definitions to empower government action against everyday American citizens using their self-endowed natural rights to use new-age digital assets like Bitcoin and its crypto offspring.

Whatever this bill or future legislation requires, it is clear that non-custodial solutions and peer-to-peer transactions without any intermediary will have to remain the focus for scaling the adoption of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.

This will empower those who can hold their own private keys, generate addresses, and safeguard their wealth, but it will likely deprive millions of Americans who aren’t technically able to use these tools and choke the future innovation of entrepreneurs who would like to provide those solutions.

Regulatory frameworks for digital assets will be vital going forward, but they should not come at the expense of neutering the very reason these technologies were invented: the separation of money and state.

Yaël Ossowski is the deputy director at the Consumer Choice Center and a visiting fellow at the Bitcoin Policy Institute.

Is Digital Gold The Solution To Democrats’ Digital Dollar?

Biden's executive order gives away the left’s objective. It says digital currency has 'profound implications for ... the ability to exercise human rights; financial inclusion and equity; and energy demand.'

Beware The ‘Big Brother’ Digital Dollar That Will Take Your Freedom

A Central Bank Digital Currency is high on the list of authoritarian nightmares that might happen in a second Biden administration.

‘Massive Threat’: DeSantis Says Centralized Digital Currencies Open Door To ‘Social Credit System’

'They want to get rid of cash'

Sen. Ted Cruz introduces bill to prevent the Fed from establishing a central bank digital currency



Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) introduced a bill Tuesday aimed at preventing the Federal Reserve from following the lead of totalitarian regimes like China in establishing a central bank digital currency. The legislation (S.887), co-sponsored by Sens. Mike Braun (R-Ind.) and Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), cites as cause the eventuality that a CBDC would be used as a "financial surveillance tool by the federal government."

"The federal government has no authority to unilaterally establish a central bank currency," Cruz said in a statement.

Cruz noted that the bill, which has been referred to the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs, "goes a long way in making sure big government doesn’t attempt to centralize or control cryptocurrency and instead, allows it to thrive in the United States. We should be empowering entrepreneurs, enabling innovation, and increasing individual freedom — not stifling it."

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell suggested in June 2022 that an American CBDC could "potentially help maintain the dollar's international standing," noting that the Fed was considering whether it might "improve on an already safe and efficient domestic payments system."

While the Fed may think it worth looking into, Braun noted a U.S. CBDC "is simply a bad idea."

"The federal government should not have even more control over your own money," added Braun.

Nationally syndicated radio host and co-founder of Blaze Media Glenn Beck recently underscored that the problem with a CBDC is that "there is no physical cash. There’s even [a physical aspect] with Bitcoin — you can take it on a thumb drive and you stick it in your pocket, or you can move it from one off-ramp to another. Just memorize your seed phrase, that’s all … but it’s yours."

Conversely, with a CBDC, it's only electronic, "only in the Federal Reserve System," noted Beck.

The CATO Institute published a study last month that identified a number of faults with a CBDC, emphasizing that it would "most likely be the single largest assault to financial privacy since the creation of the Bank Secrecy Act and the establishment of the third-party doctrine."

The study indicated that a CBDC will make the process by which governments freeze someone's financial resources — as Canadian banks did in concert with the Trudeau government in its crackdown efforts on peaceful protesters in 2022 — easier and faster, having established "a direct line between citizens and the government itself."

Policymakers would also be able to set negative interest rates, thereby forcing spending by causing people to lose money.

In addition to a loss of transparency and the ability to force spending, the government would also be put in a position where it could prohibit people from buying certain goods (e.g., alcohol).

Cruz's Tuesday statement advanced another concern raised in the CATO study: A CBDC would leave Americans' financial information vulnerable to attack. The study noted recent IRS data breaches have evidenced the fallout that might occur in the event that hundreds of millions of Americans' sensitive financial information was centralized, then breached.

Grassley raised the matter that a decision this impactful should not be made by government bureaucrats, but rather by elected representatives of the American people.

Even then, Grassley stressed that the "American people ought to be able to spend their money how they choose without the possibility that every transaction could be tracked by the government."

Cruz introduced his bill one day after Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) announced legislation to ban CBDCs in Florida.

"The Biden administration’s efforts to inject a Centralized Bank Digital Currency is about surveillance and control," DeSantis said in a statement. "Today’s announcement will protect Florida consumers and businesses from the reckless adoption of a 'centralized digital dollar' which will stifle innovation and promote government-sanctioned surveillance."

DeSantis' office suggested that a federally controlled CBDC was "the most recent way the Davos elites are attempting to backdoor woke ideology like Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) into the United States financial system, threatening individual privacy and economic freedom."

Concerning DeSantis' initiative, Foundation for Government Accountability CEO Tarren Bragdon said, "Our money says In God We Trust. The central bank digital currency changes that to In Government We Trust. That’s wrong and I am grateful for the Governor’s continued pushback of an out-of-control DC bureaucracy."

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