Trump Refuses to Sign Housing Bill With CBDC Ban, Demanding Passage of Voter ID Legislation

President Donald Trump canceled a signing ceremony Wednesday for the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act, a bipartisan housing affordability bill that had cleared the Senate 85-5 and the House 358-32 and contained a four-year prohibition on the Federal Reserve issuing a central bank digital currency.

Trump posted on Truth Social that the ceremony was “hereby cancelled until such time as we pass the desperately needed SAVE AMERICA ACT, which I consider to be a National Emergency.” The SAVE America Act would require voters to provide proof of citizenship, a policy Republican Senate leadership has repeatedly described as stalled.

This story is an excerpt from the Unchained Daily newsletter.

The housing bill had drawn extraordinary bipartisan support for its provisions cutting building restrictions and barring large institutional investors from buying residential properties. For the crypto and privacy communities, the bill also carried a provision tucked in earlier this year barring the Federal Reserve from creating or testing a digital dollar directly or through financial institutions, a ban running through December 31, 2030. Trump signed an executive order last year banning moves toward a CBDC, and the statutory version was seen as a more durable protection.

If Trump ultimately vetoes the housing bill, Congress would need a two-thirds supermajority in both chambers to override it — a threshold the bill surpassed on its first vote, though whether that coalition holds after Trump’s move remains unclear. The president has a ten-day window after a bill reaches his desk to sign or veto it.

Beyond derailing the CBDC ban, Trump’s dispute with Congress could further reduce the odds of the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act passing anytime soon by using up valuable legislative time. The White House had pushed for a July 4 deadline for the Clarity Act, and Congress has roughly five weeks before its summer recess.

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