Senate Banking Committee cancels confirmation vote for SEC’s Caroline Crenshaw

In the meantime, Trump will name either Commissioner Hester Peirce or Mark Uyeda as acting chair

article-image

Mark Van Scyoc/Shutterstock modified by Blockworks

share


This is a segment from the Forward Guidance newsletter. To read full editions, subscribe.


The Senate Banking Committee on Tuesday decided to abandon its effort to re-confirm SEC Commissioner Caroline Crenshaw. 

The news, somewhat ironically, was leaked while Sen. Tim Scott, the Republican gunning to lead the Banking Committee next session, was wrapping up his remarks at the Blockchain Association event. 

Crenshaw’s confirmation vote, initially scheduled for last week, was postponed after Senate Republicans successfully blocked it.

“Having fought ‘train Crenshaw’ for the last several months… to have a resounding victory of not having her go forward last week, I was so excited,” Scott said before learning the vote had been canceled. 

The vote was rescheduled for this week, but the committee “just didn’t have the votes,” a person familiar with the matter said. A spokesperson from the committee disagreed, saying they “had the support,” but “ran out of time.” 

A representative for Crenshaw did not immediately return a request for comment. 

Now that Crenshaw is out and Chair Gary Gensler and Commissioner Jaime Lizárraga, both Democrats, will be resigning in the new year, President-elect Donald Trump now has three seats to fill. 

In the meantime, Trump will name either Commissioner Hester Peirce or Mark Uyeda as acting chair while his pick for the top job, Republican Paul Atkins, is confirmed. 

So the commission is going to be small — at least for the first few weeks of 2025. This will not be the first time the SEC has operated with only two commissioners, and precedent largely supports allowing these two commissioners to vote on matters and conduct business as usual. 

The more provocative these actions are, though, the greater the likelihood of a legal battle. When it comes to making the agenda, the chair, or acting chair, holds all the power.


Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:

Tags

Decoding crypto and the markets. Daily, with Byron Gilliam.

Upcoming Events

Old Billingsgate

Mon - Wed, October 13 - 15, 2025

Blockworks’ Digital Asset Summit (DAS) will feature conversations between the builders, allocators, and legislators who will shape the trajectory of the digital asset ecosystem in the US and abroad.

recent research

Research Report Templates.png

Research

USDai is a synthetic dollar fully backed by tokenized three‑month T-bills custodied by M^0. When holders stake USDai in an ERC-4626 vault, they mint sUSDai, which finances short-term, amortizing loans secured by NVIDIA-class GPUs and servers.

article-image

The stablecoin bill now heads to the president’s desk

article-image

The House on Thursday passed the CLARITY Act, a landmark cryptocurrency market structure bill

article-image

Interchain Labs will focus on sovereign L1s and institutional demand, abandoning plans for smart contracts on the Cosmos Hub

article-image

Also, only three tokens have outperformed bitcoin so far this year: XMR, HYPE and SKY

article-image

The fund group has submitted proposals in recent months for other funds that would hold litecoin, solana, XRP, HBAR, Sui and others

article-image

Momentum’s back — BTC leads, risk assets follow