Inside the fight to keep your coins with Tim Hite | The Last Free Americans

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Nov 12, 2025

Tim Hite, director of policy at Exodus and a former congressional staffer, dives into the pivotal battle for self-custody rights. He shares the inspiring origins of the Keep Your Coins Act and discusses how property rights are evolving in our digital age. Tim highlights the risks posed by CBDCs to individual rights and contrasts affirming rights versus regulatory restrictions. He also examines how social media is reshaping the legislative landscape and emphasizes the importance of public awareness in defending freedom in the crypto space.

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ANECDOTE

How The Keep Your Coins Act Began

Tim Hite recalled drafting the Keep Your Coins Act after Congressman Warren Davidson worried regulators would attack self-custody.
They named the bill as a playful nod to KYC and used it to spark a principled property-rights conversation.

INSIGHT

Two Ways To Protect Self-Custody

The Keep Your Coins Act and the Clarity Act protect self-custody via different legal frames but target the same outcome.
One affirms an existing right while the other more directly restricts regulators' authority.

INSIGHT

Digital Ownership Rewrites Property Rights

Digital ownership forces a reexamination of traditional property rights in the internet era.
Law and policy must adapt because many Americans assume an intermediated financial system is the default.

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Tim Hite is the director of policy at Exodus and a former congressional staffer for Rep. Warren Davidson. He helped shape early self-custody legislation—including the Keep Your Coins Act (a playful nod to “KYC”)—and bridges law, technology, and individual rights. In this episode, Tim’s discussion kicks off The Last Free Americans miniseries to share the origin story of self-custody protections on Capitol Hill, how “keep your coins” language differs from the Clarity Act’s approach, and what meaningful safeguards against CBDCs could look like. We dig into the evolution of property rights in a digital world, why illicit-finance fears are often overstated, and how social media has changed the legislative battlefield.

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TIMESTAMPS:
0:00 – Intro, disclaimers & why self-custody matters now
0:51 – “The Last Free Americans”: series premise
1:16 – Tim’s path: 2017 bull run, law school, FINRA, and meeting Rep. Davidson
3:34 – From Hill staffer to crypto policy: Token Taxonomy Act & early frameworks
6:51 – The spark for the Keep Your Coins Act and naming the bill
11:12 – Two legislative styles: affirming a right vs. restricting regulators
16:24 – Digital ownership as a new chapter in American property rights
19:05 – CBDCs vs. self-custody: opposite ends of the spectrum
22:30 – Social media’s role: sunlight, mobilization, and changing the odds
30:34 – The 2020 “unhosted wallet” rule & why KYCs on self-hosted wallets don’t fit
39:00 – Bank Secrecy Act’s $10k threshold, report overload, and diminishing returns
41:37 – House passage, Senate path, and realistic timelines for the Clarity Act
47:26 – What’s next: tokenized securities and the future of self-custody
52:58 – Peer-to-peer (with an asterisk): whitelists, accounts, and true control
55:01 – Closing thoughts: momentum, vigilance, and “nature finds a way”

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