The Solana Policy Institute is calling for stronger legal protections for software developers in the wake of the guilty verdict against Tornado Cash developer Roman Storm, as lawmakers in Washington consider legislation that could codify those safeguards.
In an open letter on Wednesday, Solana Policy Institute President Kristin Smith and its CEO Miller Whitehouse-Levine warned that Storm’s case is “not an isolated dispute.”
“It is a test of whether the United States will continue to support and lead in open innovation – or whether fear and misinterpretation will drive builders out of the system entirely,” they said in the letter.
In August, Storm was found guilty on a money transmitting charge, but the jury could not come to a conclusion on a money laundering charge and another related to sanctions. Tornado Cash is a decentralized crypto mixing service designed to provide privacy for its users.
Since the verdict, crypto advocates have rallied behind Storm to get an appeal, donating millions to his legal defense. Storm’s case began during the Biden administration, but since the start of the Trump administration, its stance on software developers has shifted. In August, a statement was made by Matthew J Galeotti, acting assistant attorney general of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division, where he said “writing code” is not a crime.
When asked why he believes the case hadn’t been dropped, Whitehouse-Levine said there was hope.
“It’s really unfortunate because this is certainly the largest regulatory, and in this instance criminal, overhang for the ecosystem in the United States at the moment,” Whitehouse-Levine said in an interview with The Block. “Given that sentencing has not occurred — hope springs eternal.”
As Storm awaits sentencing, prominent figures in the crypto industry have publicly voiced support. Earlier this month, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin published a letter supporting Storm and said the prosecutors were centered on software development rather than direct financial harm. Over the past year, over $6.3 million were donanted for Storm’s defense, according to a website supporting the developer.
Protections for software developers were included in the latest version of the Senate Banking Committee’s bill text to regulate the crypto industry as a whole. The Blockchain Regulatory Certainty Act, or BRCA, was included in the bill text released last week and would clarify that non-custodial software developers, who do not control users’ funds, are not considered money transmitters. It would create clear guardrails for when developers and service providers would be exempt from money transmitting laws.
“That is a major highlight in the bill, and is a huge, huge win,” Whitehouse-Levine said.
© 2026 The Block. All Rights Reserved. This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.
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