Senator Bill Hagerty (R-TN), a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee and the Banking, Housing, & Urban Affairs Committee, on Thursday voted against the nomination of Rohit Chopra to be the Director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB).
He said, “Rohit Chopra appears ready to push anti-job-creation policies and further insert the CFPB into the private transactions of the American people.
This nominee has dodged Senators’ questions throughout the confirmation process, casting serious doubt on how accountable his agency will be to the people’s elected representatives. I will always support protecting consumers from bad business practices, but we need leaders who will do so responsibly, apolitically, and in a manner that won’t cost jobs—that is not likely to be the case with Mr. Chopra, and as such is disqualifying.”
Last week, Senator Hagerty introduced legislation that would make the agency accountable to the American people by requiring that its funding be appropriated by Congress, as is the case for other Executive Branch agencies. Currently, the Federal Reserve is required to provide whatever funding that the CFPB requests within certain limits, a highly unusual arrangement that allows the CFPB to avoid the fiscal accountability to which the rest of the Executive Branch is subject.
The bill has 16 co-sponsors.