Crypto didn’t take too much attention away from the farm bill – but the plan would be much bigger than that.

The House Agriculture Committee will release the draft of a digital asset market structure bill this week and mark it up next week, along with the House Financial Services Committee, House Agriculture Committee Chairman Glenn “GT” Thompson, R-Pa., told reporters at a breakfast briefing today.

The bill is produced as part of the committee’s jurisdiction over the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. The Financial Services Committee has jurisdiction over the Securities and Exchange Commission, and the two committees have been working closely together on the CFTC provisions of the bill.

Thompson was joined at the briefing by Rep. Dusty Johnson, R-S.D., chairman of the House Agriculture Commodity Markets, Digital Assets and Rural Development Subcommittee. Johnson said he has spoken every week for two months with Rep. French Hill, R-Ark., the House Financial Services Digital Assets, Financial Technology and Inclusion Subcommittee chairman, to develop the joint bill.

Thompson said a court ruling that Ripple Labs Inc. did not violate federal securities laws in selling its XRP tokens directly to sophisticated investors, showed the need for legislation to address the structure of digital assets markets. Johnson said some Democrats believe that the SEC has enough authority to regulate the digital assets market, but the Ripple ruling showed that is not the case.

The bill will make clear that the United States is the country where the digital asset marketplace should be located, Thompson said.

Thompson maintained that the need to produce a bill regulating the digital assets market has not slowed work on the farm bill, saying, “We can walk and chew gum at the same time.”

Thompson said he hopes to hold a markup on the farm bill in mid-September and will release a draft before the markup.