Growing up on a farm taught me one lesson early: strong roots matter. A farm without deep roots in its land, in its soil, in its community seldom thrives. Likewise, our rural economy depends on financial institutions that are deeply rooted in their community, serving not just customers, but neighbors, farms, and small-town businesses.

That is why I am sounding the alarm about a loophole in the new federal law known as the GENIUS Act. The law was meant to bring some order and clarity to the fast-moving world of digital payments, but a gap in the language could end up hurting the backbone of rural communities — our local community banks.

The GENIUS Act places important new rules on issuers of stablecoins including barring them directly from paying interest to consumers on those stablecoins

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