Senate Passes Housing Bill With Fed CBDC Ban Through 2030 in 85-5 Vote - "The Defiant"

The US Senate passed sweeping bipartisan housing legislation Monday by a vote of 85-5, sending a package that includes a statutory ban on a Federal Reserve central bank digital currency through December 31, 2030 toward the president's desk.

The 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act (H.R. 6644), led by Senate Banking Committee Chairman Tim Scott (R-SC) and Ranking Member Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), cleared the chamber Monday evening. The bill prohibits the Federal Reserve from issuing a digital dollar, directly or through intermediaries, for roughly four years. A House floor vote was expected as soon as Tuesday before the package heads to President Trump.

The CBDC restriction sits alongside 44 other housing-supply provisions in H.R. 6644. Per the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act, the text bars the Fed from issuing any digital asset broadly equivalent to a central bank digital currency and closes an indirect-issuance path that critics said would allow a retail CBDC to flow through commercial banks or payment firms. The ban runs through December 31, 2030.

The provision includes a carve-out for dollar-denominated digital currencies that operate as open, permissionless networks with cash-like privacy protections, shielding existing private-sector stablecoins from the prohibition.