Unchained - Sam Lyman Puts 70% Odds on Clarity Passing Before Recess

Episode Date: July 15, 2026

Austin Campbell draws a parallel between the AI data center backlash and the decades-long collapse of US nuclear power, then Sam Lyman of the Bitcoin Policy Institute puts real odds on whether the Clarity Act passes the Senate before August recess. Hosts: Austin Campbell, Host of Bits + Bips, Founder of Zero Knowledge Group, and Adjunct Professor at NYU Stern Ram Ahluwalia, Co-host of Bits + Bips and CEO of Lumida Chris Perkins, Co-host of Bits + Bips and Head of Franklin Crypto Guest: Sam Lyman - Head of Research at the Bitcoin Policy Institute This clip is from a longer conversation on foreign funded opposition to AI data centers and the odds of the Clarity Act passing. Full episode here: https://youtu.be/-xbSniveaQU  We go live every Monday - subscribe to catch it live. Sponsor Cape: Your biggest crypto vulnerability isn't your wallet, it's your phone number. Cape is America's privacy-first mobile carrier that rotates your SIM identity daily and blocks SIM swaps before they happen. Get 33% off your first six months at https://cape.co/unchained  (use code: UNCHAINED). Chapters: 🏗️ 00:00 Austin compares the AI backlash to nuclear power's collapse, citing Indian Point 🧭 01:21 Sam calls nuclear the ideal analogy: a problem we solved, then banned 🏠 02:10 Why Sam says AI's real opposition comes from inside the house 👷 02:37 The blue-collar AI boom: construction jobs, electricians, and data centers 🗳️ 04:07 Ram says political leadership, not just technology, has to show up 🎯 05:15 Sam puts Clarity's odds at 70% before August recess ⏳ 06:55 Why the August recess deadline is the real driver of momentum 📉 07:38 Sam's odds drop to 35 to 40% if Congress doesn't act in the next few weeks Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Well, I was going to say first, before we get to solutions, let's draw a parallel to one that we didn't have an effective solution for, which is what you're describing to me sounds a lot like why we got blocked on nuclear power in the United States of America, which is to say, if you're really an environmentalist and you understand durability for climate change plus preservation of the environment, you are pro nuclear power. That is basically the punchline. It is much cleaner than the other forms, Modern nuclear reactors are very safe. Ironically, most of the problems we've had, things like Fukushima, are because we couldn't build the new stuff and continued operating the old stuff that doesn't work the way it should. Because let me tell you right now, we've made a lot of technological advancements from the 1950s to the present. And so on nuclear power in the United States, we really lost the plot. I think only recently, if we started to figure out, actually, wait a minute, we should be building

a hell of a lot more of this stuff. And like, I live in New York City. it was clearly an own goal to shut down Indian point. If you look at what's happening with the power grid in the United States, and all of the people who advocated for that on environmental grounds, shot themselves in the foot and then reloaded and continued firing. So I would ask you, what is the potential solution here to avoid the mistakes that we made around nuclear power? Yeah, Austin, that's the perfect parallel.

They say that we solved climate change about 80 years ago, and then we banned that solution. And that was nuclear power. I think nuclear power is an ideal analogy for what we're facing right now because AI has the potential to spread so many benefits across society in a way that progressives should support. I think the difficulty here in large part comes from the messaging from AI executives themselves. On one hand, you hear that we need to build AI infrastructure and data centers to beat China.

Then on the other hand, you have the same executives saying that this same artificial intelligence is going to eliminate up to 50% of white-collar jobs in the next five years. Who's going to support that? I feel like in large part, a lot of the opposition to data centers not only comes from foreign influence, but the call at a certain point is coming from inside the house. You have AI executives who are doing more to spread fear about the technology than they're building than the foreign actors are themselves,

and that's something that has to stop immediately. I think those AI executives for years have been messaging to Wall Street about their technology being the end-all be-all. And they've done so at the expense of messaging to Main Street about how this technology will actually materially benefit them in their lives. And there's many ways that we can lay that out right now. For example, we're seeing a blue-collar boom with the AI build-out. As we speak, you have about half a million temporary construction jobs

that can be directly linked to the AI build-out. In addition to that, you have tens of thousands of permanent data center jobs that will be associated with these data centers being built across the country. And you have a huge struggle or a huge race to find electricians. There's electricians who have jumped jobs three times over the last 18 months because rates are so high for good electricians right now, getting these data centers online. People look at only one layer of the AI stack, which is the interface with chat GPT and with Claude, without looking at the whole stack and all the jobs associated with it. And beyond that, we need to help the American people

understand that in an economy where knowledge becomes to a certain extent democratized and automated, what carries a premium, it's the human being themselves. That need to always have a human being in the loop will only increase as AI becomes more integrated into our economy. So what we're looking at, as with every other technological trend before this one, our jobs that are different than the jobs of today, but materially better and easier and more human than the jobs of yesterday. I think we saw that with industrialization in the 1800s to the present day. People working a desk job have much easier, better lives than people plowing the fields, for example. I think you're about to see that with AI. It's going to automate a lot of the drudgery that we usually associate with office work

to make the work nature itself a lot more human, a lot more interpersonal in nature. I would add that you need political leadership also. People follow their leaders. Leaders are influential and across both sides of the aisle, you have opposition to AI, whether that's Ron DeSantis or Governor Newsom. So you need political leadership. And AI, to your point, is driving blue-collar work and better wages. And in the future, it's going to enable, say, a CPA to get 10 times the work or volume done through AI agents. So it's going to benefit American productivity and earnings tremendously. You do need political leadership to get behind this.

Trump actually spends more time talking about crypto than AI. I think he needs to dial up more focus on AI. Oh, come on, man. Come on, man. Maybe that is not going to get for crypto prices, but let me just add what. Let's talk briefly. Hold on. Let's talk briefly about the other thing Trump has been focused on

because Sam has to leave at the half hour. Sam, clarity. Is it going to pass. That has been the question for so many months now, right? My response is, I think now or never is the reality of our situation, but I would put the probability of clarity passing in the next few weeks in about 70%. And that's not just wishcasting. That's what I'm looking at when I go to these meetings on the hill and I see the drive and the energy behind this bill. It's all there. Conveniently, we're starting to see a lot of support from hold out, on the left. In particular, there was some concern about BRCA, the blockchain regulatory

certainty act, which was a critical component of the Clarity Act in allowing Bitcoin developers to be able to continue to do their jobs. There was some resistance from Democrats on that specific aspect of the bill, but just recently we saw that Senator Wyden, who has been a leader on a lot of technological issues being legislated over the past couple decades. He actually came out and said that the Clarity Act needs to include BRCA. So that's a huge win. I also think with the passing of the late Senator Lindsey Graham, you're going to see even more momentum for this to happen. Senator Graham was a big advocate for getting this thing across the finish line. We saw Patrick Witt, who is the head of digital asset policy at the White House. He talked this morning, made a post on X that

it's time. It's time to pass this bill. Clearly, President Trump is very much behind it, too. I think they recognize that clarity passing is critical to maintaining our technological edge as a country in addition to leading on AI. So I think that pieces are coming together. Of course, this is Congress. They say that nothing moves members of Congress more than jet fumes, meaning the call of August recess is looming in the next few weeks. And if anything is going to motivate members to get this thing across the finish line, I think it's that need to get back to their districts to get home and to start campaigning. And so I do think that we'll get it across the finish line in the next few weeks here, but the probability of about 70% right now.

All right. So I'm going to ask you one question before we have to let you go. And then Chris and Rahm and I can continue to debate this one, which is if you're at 70 now, you're basically telling me, if I'm hearing this right, we're going to pass it by the time we get too far into August because otherwise we go into recess, right? you're not an optimist that we can get this done while everybody is campaigning? I'm not. The legislative window is tightening, which, again, is one of the reasons why I think the odds

for passing it now are greater. What I've seen with a lot of legislation in the past is that as you get closer and closer to that drop deadline, people will move. Deals will be made at the last minute. You see this frequently with omnibus deals, for example. And so because of that, I think the odds are greater that will happen the next few weeks now. If we don't get it across the finish line in the next few weeks, the ability to pass this bill this year is much smaller. I think it probably decreases that point, probably down to 35 to 40%.

If you like this segment, please like, subscribe, and tune in every Monday at 4.30 p.m. Eastern time. I'm Austin Campbell, the host of Bips and Bips, along with my friends Rahm Alawalia and Chris Perkins and our slate of exceptional guests. Every week, we're going to discuss macro, crypto, and the collision. of worlds covering topics that move markets and shape the financial landscape. If you hold crypto on your phone, your biggest vulnerability isn't your wallet. It's your carrier. AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile have been breached again and again, and SIM swaps are still one of the easiest ways for attackers to drain accounts. That's where CAPE comes in, America's Privacy First Mobile Carrier. Same premium service, but CAP rotates the identifier on your SIM

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