Today, House Agriculture Subcommittee on Commodity Markets, Digital Assets, and Rural Development Ranking Member Don Davis (NC-01) delivered the following opening statement at a hearing titled “American Innovation and the Future of Digital Assets: On-Chain Tools for an Off-Chain World.” Watch the full hearing here.

Good afternoon. I thank our subcommittee chair, Dusty Johnson, and our witnesses for your service and commitment to such an important topic.  

Just this past month, I had the privilege of participating in The Digital Chamber’s DC Blockchain Summit. We came together to reinforce a simple but powerful idea: digital asset policy remains vital for American innovation.  

My priorities for the subcommittee are:

Getting digital market structure legislation across the finish line to provide our markets with the certainty they need to continue to operate and to ensure they remain in the U.S. and not abroad. The future is counting on us and we must rise for the occasion. 

Next, we must reauthorize the CFTC. With increased work for the CFTC coming under future market structure and other related legislation, we need to ensure the CFTC is reauthorized and provided with the adequate ability and staffing to carry out its job.

Finally, North Carolina’s First Congressional District and rural America rely on rural development. Broadband deployment, community facilities support, and all of the USDA RD programs that support our rural communities.

These priorities come with the need for the subcommittee to hold hearings, roundtables, and events focused on the subcommittee’s work.

As the House Financial Services Committee advances legislation, it’s vital that our subcommittee keeps pace. Our jurisdiction—commodity markets, digital assets, and rural development—places us at the intersection of innovation and making a difference in the lives of many across the nation.

Any legislative framework we move forward must account not only for market structure and investor protection but also for innovation happening far from the trading floors, innovation that can empower rural America, improve public services, and unlock economic opportunity where it’s needed most.

I look forward to working with Chairman Johnson to schedule these events and to move forward with good legislation that unlocks American ingenuity. 

Now to shift to the focus of the hearing today. Blockchain technologies uses for non-crypto applications.

So often, when we hear about blockchain, it’s focused on cryptocurrencies and digital finance. Many don’t understand that blockchain technology can be used across industries for countless reasons.

Today’s hearing provides us with an opportunity to educate the Members of the Subcommittee so that we can educate our constituents and better connect the technology to how it impacts their daily lives.

The potential of this technology in improving processes for industries across the U.S. is limitless. That is why we need to be better messengers and communicators around this complicated technology. I know the first time I heard about it from my son, it took me a while to grasp it.

For the House Agriculture Committee, the usage of this technology increases across the country, and as the technology continues to improve, all districts across the country will benefit. Whether it be small businesses, farmers, rural communities, or underinvested communities like the ones I represent in eastern North Carolina.

I look forward to hearing from the witnesses about the various ways that they are using blockchain technology. I think it will serve as an opportunity to learn how we can help assist our home communities in accessing and using the technology to allow them to thrive.