Arizona senator wants Bitcoin to become legal tender in the state

El Salvador is the first country to declare Bitcoin (BTC) legal tender but other jurisdictions appear to be set on following on its footsteps and plan on making the world’s largest crypto in terms of market cap also declared legal tender in their jurisdictions. Arizona may even be joining the trend if a state senator gets her way.

Arizona State Senator Wendy Rogers has introduced a set of crypto-related bills, one of which seeks to make Bitcoin (BTC) legal tender in the state. The bills are co-sported by her Republican colleagues Jeff Weninger and J.D. Mesnard, Bitcoin.com reported.

One bill proposes to make Bitcoin legal tender in Arizona. Cryptocurrency is defined by the legislation as “the decentralized, peer-to-peer digital currency in which a record of transactions is maintained on the bitcoin blockchain and new units of currency are generated by the computational solution of mathematical problems and that operates independently of a central bank.”

Another bill aims to increase and promote crypto usage. It seeks to allow state agencies to enter “into an agreement with a cryptocurrency issuer to provide a method to accept cryptocurrency as a payment method of fines, civil penalties or other penalties, rent, rates, taxes, fees, charges, revenue, financial obligations, and special assessments to pay any amount due to that agency or this state.”

A similar bill that seeks to make Bitcoin legal tender was also introduced by Rogers last year but it was shut down. “Centralized digital money controlled by the central bankers is slavery. Decentralized bitcoin is freedom,” the lawmaker tweeted in April 2022.

A number of lawmakers worldwide have been attempting to replicate El Salvador’s success in declaring Bitcoin legal tender within its territory. In September 2021, the Latin American country set the record of being the first country to adopt BTC as a legal tender. In November last year, its pro-Bitcon president Nayib Bukele announced that the country is buying bitcoin every day.

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