- Congressman Tom Emmer has reintroduced legislation designed to prevent the creation of a CBDC.
- He claims that the bill aims to safeguard the financial privacy rights of Americans
- President Biden is “willing to compromise the American people’s right to financial privacy for a surveillance-style CBDC,” he said.
- Tom Emmer first introduced the anti-CBDC bill in Jan 2022, which went to a formal discussion in Feb 2023.
Majority Whip of the United States House of Representatives, Tom Emmer, along with 49 initial co-sponsors, has reintroduced legislation designed to prevent non-elected officials in Washington from creating a central bank digital currency (CBDC).
This anti-CBDC bill, known as the “CBDC Anti-Surveillance State Act,” was recently reintroduced in the United States House of Representatives. Tom Emmer claims that the bill aims to safeguard the financial privacy rights of Americans
🚨Today, with 49 of my Republican colleagues, I reintroduced the CBDC Anti-Surveillance State Act👇
— Tom Emmer (@GOPMajorityWhip) September 12, 2023
According to the press-release, Emmer, a republican, pointed at the Congress by stating that President Biden is “willing to compromise the American people’s right to financial privacy for a surveillance-style CBDC.” He said:
“That’s why I’m reintroducing my landmark legislation to put a check on unelected bureaucrats and ensure the United States’ digital currency policy upholds our values of privacy, individual sovereignty, and free-market competitiveness.”
Whip Emmer concluded by emphasizing that if a government-issued CBDC is not built with characteristics like openness, permissionless access, and privacy akin to cash transactions, it could essentially become a Chinese Communist Party-style surveillance tool. This, according to him, in turn, could pose a threat to the fundamental values of the American way of life.
Tom Emmer first introduced this anti-CBDC bill in January 2022, which officially went to a formal discussion with Congress in February 2023. It aims to limit the Federal Reserve from launching a programmable digital dollar that could potentially be used for surveillance, according to Emmer and could harm the American way of life.
The proposed bill contains precise provisions that explicitly prevent the Federal Reserve from distributing a CBDC to individuals. Representative Emmer argues that this restriction is crucial in preventing the Fed from morphing into a retail banking entity with the capacity to collect sensitive personal financial information.
Furthermore, the bill, which is supported by Senators French Hill, Warren Davidson and Mike Flood, among others, imposes a prohibition on the central bank’s utilization of any CBDC as a tool for implementing monetary policies.
As reported earlier by Bitnation, Tom Emmer also seeks to introduce an appropriations amendment that will reduce the hold that the US securities regulator has over the digital asset sector
