One of the crypto industry's central lobbying aims — to protect software developers from being held legally responsible when criminals abuse their technology — may be in jeopardy from Democrats led by U.S. Senator Mark Warner, according to people familiar with legislative negotiations.

The Senate is set to return to work in Washington next week, with the completion of a crypto market structure bill as one of its top agenda items. In the bipartisan talks over that bill, Warner is said to have held reservations about the approach in the U.S. House of Representatives’ version of the bill known as the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act, which gave developers legal cover, according to three people with knowledge of the negotiation.

Warner, a Virginia Democrat who is the vice chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, maintains a close focus on national security issues, and he's said to have balked at the rampant hacks and money laundering concerns that he's associated with the decentralized finance (DeFi) end of the crypto sector. In the past, he's raised objections over reports that cryptocurrency may have been used to move assets to terrorist groups, and he pushed a bill in 2023 that looked to saddle DeFi platforms with the same anti-money laundering (AML) requirements that traditional finance firms must meet — a potentially existential threat to the way the decentralized projects operate without core management.

Back then, Warner said such an effort would "help maintain the robust AML and sanctions enforcement we need to protect our national security, while allowing participants who play by the rules to continue to take advantage of the potential of distributed ledger technologies," additionally noting his views that "criminals and rogue states continue to use crypto to launder money, evade sanctions, and conceal illicit activity."

Then he pursued an appropriations provision last year that would have automated a process to sanction "foreign digital asset transaction facilitators" – including crypto exchanges – linked to users who support terrorism groups. So he has a background in seeking to hold digital assets insiders responsible for the illicit use of their products.

A spokesperson for the senator didn't immediately respond to a request for comment on his position in the latest negotiations, but Republican senators have been seeking to fast-track the Senate's market structure bill, trying to follow the House in a wide, bipartisan approval.

Warner is among the Democrats on the Senate Banking Committee — one of the two panels that needs to come to agreement on the crypto legislation before it can move on to a floor vote.

Unlike with the more aggressive stance of fellow Democrat Senator Elizabeth Warren, the industry generally sees Warner as a member with a balanced view on crypto issues, having supported the sector in previous votes, such as in the recent passage of the bill to regulate U.S. stablecoin issuers — still standing as the industry's biggest achievement in Washington. Digital assets political organization Stand With Crypto gives him an "A" grade as a lawmaker who "strongly supports crypto."

When the Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins (GENIUS) Act was still moving through the Senate before its passage by a wide margin in June, some Democrats had halted the process on that bill to object to security and illicit-finance aspects of the industry (in addition to the potential conflicts posed by President Donald Trump's own stablecoin business interests.) The disagreements were kicked down the road in favor of an easy passage of that earlier bill, with the knowledge that this market structure legislation would be a better place to hash out those concerns.

That debate is now arriving for the bill that's the lynchpin of the digital assets sector's Washington plans. This legislation to set out tailored regulations for U.S. crypto transactions is seen as necessary for the industry to come into its own and to bring remaining institutional players and hesitant retail investors into the realm of digital tokens.

Behind closed doors, crypto lobbyists are wondering if Warner's background in venture-capital work for technology firms will help them make a case for protecting software-writing innovators from legal liability. In light of cases such as Tornado Cash developer Roman Storm's recent criminal conviction, the urgency to establish a shield is amplifying.

Read More: Roman Storm Guilty of Unlicensed Money Transmitting Conspiracy in Partial Verdict

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