Senators Bill Cassidy (R-LA) and Cynthia Lummis (R-WY) introduced the Mined in America Act on March 30, 2026, a bill that would direct the Department of Commerce to create a voluntary certification program for domestically mined bitcoin and codify President Trump's Strategic Bitcoin Reserve into federal statute. The legislation was announced simultaneously by CoinDesk, Bitcoin Magazine, and CoinMarketCap.
Bitcoin traded at $66,535 as of March 30, 2026, down 6.4% over seven days, with the Fear and Greed Index at 25 (Fear).
A Certification Seal for American Mining
The Mined in America Act (S.4251) directs the Secretary of Commerce to establish a voluntary Mined in America Certification Program. Miners who meet the program's standards would receive a federal certification that their operations use hardware manufactured in the United States or allied nations, not equipment from foreign adversaries.
The bill also directs federal programs and purchasing authority to promote the replacement of mining hardware linked to foreign adversaries with domestically produced compute infrastructure. That language targets the dominance of Bitmain Technologies, the Beijing-based company that manufactures the majority of the world's bitcoin mining rigs.
The timing is not accidental. Three days earlier, Senator Elizabeth Warren sent a letter to the Commerce Department demanding answers about Bitmain's presence near US military installations after the Department of Homeland Security's Operation Red Sunset flagged over 16,000 Bitmain rigs at sensitive locations. The Cassidy-Lummis bill addresses the same national security concern from the supply side: rather than just investigating existing Bitmain hardware, it creates a federal framework to incentivize replacing it.
The certification is voluntary. Miners who do not participate face no penalties, but the bill gives Commerce the authority to channel federal incentives, grants, and procurement preferences toward certified operations. In practice, this creates a two-tier market: miners running certified American-made or allied-nation hardware could gain preferential access to federal programs, while those running Bitmain rigs would not.
Putting the Reserve Into Law
The second major provision codifies Trump's Strategic Bitcoin Reserve into federal law. Trump signed an executive order on March 6, 2025, establishing the reserve, but executive orders can be reversed by any future president with a signature. Codification means the reserve would require an act of Congress to dissolve.
Senator Lummis has been the leading congressional advocate for a federal bitcoin reserve since introducing the original BITCOIN Act in 2024. That bill proposed the government purchase one million bitcoin over five years, funded by diversifying existing Federal Reserve remittances. The Mined in America Act takes a different approach: rather than mandating new purchases, it locks the existing reserve into statute, making it a permanent feature of federal fiscal architecture.
The distinction matters. The existing reserve holds bitcoin seized through law enforcement actions, not bitcoin purchased on the open market. Codification turns what was a policy experiment into a durable legal structure, one that would survive a change in administration.
Why Domestic Mining Hardware Is the Pressure Point
The US currently accounts for roughly 38% of global bitcoin hashrate, the largest share of any single country. But the majority of mining rigs operating in American facilities are manufactured by Bitmain or MicroBT, both Chinese companies. This creates a dependency that the Mined in America Act explicitly targets.
The bill's "foreign adversary" framing aligns with existing federal procurement rules under the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR), which already restrict purchases of certain Chinese-made telecommunications and surveillance equipment. Extending similar logic to mining hardware would be a first for the crypto industry.
For miners, the practical impact depends on how Commerce structures the certification standards. If the program requires US-manufactured ASICs, only a handful of companies currently produce them at scale. Intel exited the bitcoin mining chip market in 2024. Auradine, a Texas-based startup, and Block's mining division are among the few domestic alternatives, though neither matches Bitmain's production volume or efficiency.
If the standard is broader, covering allied-nation manufacturers, companies like Japan's GMO Internet or South Korea's Samsung (which has fabricated mining chips) could qualify. The bill's text references "the United States or friendly nations," suggesting the latter interpretation.
What This Changes for the Broader Market
The bill does not directly affect how crypto cardholders or retail users interact with bitcoin. But it shifts the political framing of bitcoin mining from an environmental liability, the narrative that dominated 2022 and 2023, to a national security asset. That reframing has policy consequences.
If Commerce establishes a functioning certification program, "Mined in America" could become a branding standard for ETF issuers, institutional custody providers, and exchanges that want to market provably US-sourced bitcoin. The concept is analogous to "conflict-free" mineral certifications in the diamond and tantalum industries.
The codification of the Strategic Bitcoin Reserve also gives institutional holders more confidence in US policy continuity. A reserve that exists only by executive order is a political experiment. A reserve that exists by statute is infrastructure.
Overview
The Mined in America Act introduced by Senators Cassidy and Lummis would create a federal certification for US bitcoin mining operations, push miners to replace foreign adversary hardware with domestically produced equipment, and codify Trump's Strategic Bitcoin Reserve into law. The bill does not ban Chinese rigs or mandate new bitcoin purchases, but it creates a federal framework that rewards domestic mining and locks the reserve into statute. For the mining industry, the certification program could reshape hardware procurement. For the broader market, codification of the reserve removes the risk that a future president could dissolve it with a pen.
