A bipartisan House bill introduced on May 21 aims to freeze the US government’s Bitcoin holdings for a minimum of two decades. The American Reserve Modernization Act, led by Republican Nick Begich (Alaska) and Democrat Jared Golden (Maine), drew 17 original co-sponsors including Republican Mike Collins (Georgia). The bill drops the 1 million BTC purchase target from earlier proposals and focuses exclusively on securing what the government already holds. It codifies Trump’s 2025 executive order into law and makes it far harder to reverse.
Key Takeaways
- ARMA imposes a 20-year lockup on all government-held Bitcoin: sales, swaps, and auctions are prohibited
- The bill drops the 1 million BTC purchase mandate from the BITCOIN Act and directs Treasury and Commerce to study “budget-neutral” acquisition mechanisms
- Quarterly independent audits and public proof-of-reserve disclosures would become mandatory
A 20-Year Freeze and Quarterly Audits
The American Reserve Modernization Act (ARMA) was introduced on May 21 by Republican Rep. Nick Begich (Alaska) and Democrat Rep. Jared Golden (Maine), with 17 original co-sponsors including Rep. Mike Collins (Georgia). The bill directs Treasury to establish and maintain a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve with a strict prohibition on disposing of any holdings for at least 20 years. Sales, swaps, and auctions are all off the table for two decades.
The starting point is consolidation: all cryptocurrencies held across federal agencies, seized through forfeitures and penalties, would be pooled into a single Treasury-managed reserve. Bitcoin accumulated through legal proceedings over the years would be formally secured under a single institutional framework with centralized and traceable governance.
To ensure transparency, ARMA would mandate quarterly public proof-of-reserve reports paired with independent third-party audits. The governance of Bitcoin reserves is emerging as a first-order political question, well beyond the debate over the asset’s value. As we analyzed in our article on Saylor’s Never Sell doctrine, long-term institutional Bitcoin positions only hold if the conservation framework is explicit and binding.
Jared Golden, one of the few Democrats to back the bill, framed his support around durability: legislative codification protects reserves from the whims of Congress and future administrations. Without a law, a shift in majority can wipe out what the executive branch built with a single executive order.
That risk is not theoretical. Trump’s 2025 executive order establishing the strategic reserve can be revoked by any future president without a congressional vote. ARMA converts that vulnerability into lasting legislative protection.
ARMA Without a Purchase Target
ARMA represents a clear break from earlier proposals. Senator Cynthia Lummis (Wyoming) had introduced the BITCOIN Act, which would have mandated Treasury to progressively purchase 1 million Bitcoin over five years. The Begich-Golden bill sets no acquisition target and imposes no purchase figure on the government.
Instead, the bill delegates to Treasury and Commerce the study of potential acquisition mechanisms, provided they are “budget-neutral”. No direct public spending is required, but the door remains open to alternative scenarios to be defined later, such as asset conversions or other mechanisms to explore.
That restraint is directly tied to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s position: he has publicly ruled out federal Bitcoin purchases. By focusing first on what the government already holds, ARMA works around that constraint without crossing it, while leaving room for a future scaling up.
The bill’s bipartisan profile deserves attention. With 17 co-sponsors at introduction and explicit Democratic backing, ARMA builds a cross-party consensus that earlier BITCOIN Act versions failed to achieve. The strategic Bitcoin reserve is moving out of the Republican-only lane and into broader public policy territory.
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What the Opposition Reveals About What’s at Stake
The sharpest pushback came from Rep. Maxine Waters (California), who stated that “crypto has no inherent value” and that Bitcoin reserves lack the utility of traditional strategic reserves. The argument points to a structural difference: unlike oil or industrial gold, Bitcoin cannot keep production lines running during a supply crisis.
ARMA implicitly responds to that critique by not trying to fit into the operational reserve category. It claims a different role: a long-term monetary store of value. The 20-year lockup is the bill’s centerpiece precisely because it forces the time horizon, preventing short-term political trades from draining the reserve at the first sign of turbulence.
The path to enactment is long. The bill still needs a House floor vote, a Senate process, and a presidential signature. Adjustments are likely on the exact perimeter of consolidated assets and audit modalities. But its bipartisan character and consistency with the existing executive framework make it the most structurally sound strategic Bitcoin bill ever filed in Congress.
Bessent closed the door on direct purchases. ARMA doesn’t open it. It targets something else: turning what the US government already holds into an untouchable asset for two decades, regardless of political cycles and market pressure.
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