When Rep. Matt Van Epps helped lead the American Reserve Modernization Act of 2026 this week, he framed the invoice not as an summary nationwide safety measure — however as a direct extension of what he sees taking place in his personal yard.
“Nashville is one of the nation’s leading Bitcoin hubs,” Van Epps mentioned in an announcement to Bitcoin Journal, pointing to Bitcoin Park, the town’s rising digital asset neighborhood, and the annual Bitcoin convention, set to return to Nashville in 2027.
“Nashville is quickly emerging as one of the nation’s leading Bitcoin hubs, with a growing digital asset community, institutions like Bitcoin Park, and the annual Bitcoin conference, which is scheduled to come back to Nashville in 2027,” Van Epps mentioned. “Supporting this bill means supporting the financial innovation taking place in my district.”
For the freshman congressman from Tennessee’s seventh District — a West Level graduate and fight helicopter pilot who received his seat in a December 2025 particular election — that is private. The invoice is, in his telling, an announcement about what his district already represents.
Van Epps co-led the laws alongside Rep. Nick Begich (R-AK), who launched the American Reserve Modernization Act of 2026, referred to as ARMA. The invoice would codify President Trump’s March 2025 government order establishing a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve — giving it the pressure of statute quite than leaving it to the discretion of future administrations.
The reserve would sit contained in the U.S. Division of the Treasury and maintain BTC seized by federal regulation enforcement forfeitures and civil penalties.
Van Epps’ central argument for the laws is fiscal. “With a national debt of $39 trillion, this is an essential piece of legislation,” he mentioned. Below ARMA, any future sale of Bitcoin from the reserve can be permitted for just one objective: decreasing the nationwide debt. No transfers to different authorities packages, no discretionary spending — simply debt discount. The reserve, he pressured, “would be established without cost to American taxpayers”.
The invoice additionally attracts a agency line on property rights. Van Epps and Begich included language affirming that the federal authorities can not intervene with a person’s proper to personal, switch, or self-custody digital belongings — a provision that displays the libertarian undertow working by a lot of the pro-Bitcoin caucus in Congress.
Van Epps: Bitcoin can repair some issues within the U.S.
For Van Epps, the argument goes past portfolio administration. He described the reserve as one thing with the potential to “solve major problems” for the nation, with the nationwide debt chief amongst them. Bitcoin’s fastened provide and its appreciation over time, in his view, give america a instrument that gold certificates and conventional reserves can not match.
The invoice requires BTC within the reserve to be held for no less than 20 years — a provision designed to take the asset out of short-term political calculations and deal with it as a generational stability sheet choice.
Quarterly public Proof of Reserve experiences and impartial third-party audits would accompany the reserve, including a layer of statutory transparency that the prevailing government order lacks.
Eighteen unique co-sponsors signed on, stretching throughout 9 states. The Senate stays the tougher terrain — competing crypto laws is transferring by committee there, and the trail to 60 votes is unclear.
