Senators Marshall, Vance and Lummis Introduce Legislation To Establish Special Inspector General And Investigate Abuses By Financial Sector Regulators

Washington, D.C. – Senators Roger Marshall (R-KS), Cynthia Lummis (R-WY), and JD Vance (R-OH), introduced the Financial Regulatory Accountability Act to establish an Inspector General within the Treasury Department. The IG’s office would oversee allegations of regulatory abuse and misconduct by financial regulators and kneecap the ability of regulators to push left-wing policy goals through the federal regulatory system by prohibiting the use of reputational risk.

“Federal regulators have continually abused their mandates to advance radical environmental, social, and governance (ESG) agendas,” said Senator Marshall. “Our legislation ensures that the Department of Treasury has an independent Inspector General that would provide relief to banks when regulators try to exploit their authority to take down oil and gas producers and others deemed by the woke Left as undesirable.”

“For far too long, federal regulators have focused on advancing the agenda of the far left at the expense of their core mission,” said Senator Vance.“Meanwhile, regulatory bias and misconduct has gone unreported, as institutions have feared retribution. This legislation aims to correct that imbalance by ensuring the banking system is governed by ethical and apolitical oversight.”

“Federal agencies have abused the concept of reputational risk to deny legal industries access to the banking system,” said Senator Lummis. “I’m proud to join my colleague Senator Vance in introducing the Financial Regulatory Accountability Act to protect access to our financial system and ensure financial regulators cannot evade Congressional oversight.”

Read the legislation here. Read more from Politico Pro here. 

Background:

• Under the Obama administration, OCC and FDIC invoked “reputational risk” to carry out Operation Chokepoint, a debanking scheme which targeted gun manufacturers.
• Many accounts indicate that the Fed, FDIC, and OCC examiners are using “reputational risk” to quietly choke off lending to the oil and gas industry during routine supervisory check-ins.

###