Fed VCS Bowman confirmation hearing: Live coverage

Bloomberg News

WASHINGTON — Federal Reserve Gov. Michelle Bowman will testify Thursday morning before the Senate Banking Committee for her confirmation hearing to serve as the central bank's vice chair for supervision, a position recently vacated by fellow Fed Gov. Michael Barr in February.

Bowman's nomination to succeed Barr has been widely praised by the banking industry, which saw her as an accessible and reliable ally on regulatory matters during the Biden administration. Bowman frequently acted as a foil for Barr's proposals, notably voting against the Basel III capital proposal when it was introduced in July 2023, as well as a number of other initiatives put forward under President Joe Biden.

Bowman will be joined by Andrew Hughes, Trump's nominee for deputy secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development; David Woll, HUD general counsel-designate; John Hurley, Trump's pick for Treasury under secretary for terrorism and financial crimes; Landon Heid, nominated to be an assistant secretary of commerce; and David Fogel, Trump's nominee for assistant secretary of commerce and director general of the United States and Foreign Commercial Service, Department of Commerce.

Since Trump's inauguration, Bowman has used her public appearances to push for a more forward-looking approach to regulation and supervision at the Federal Reserve. In a February speech, Bowman said many of the post-2008 reforms enacted through the Dodd-Frank Act "resulted in pushing foundational banking activities out of the banking system into less regulated corners of the financial system" and questioned "whether this is appropriate."

Bowman was first nominated to serve on the Federal Reserve Board in 2018 as its community banking representative, a position created by Congress in 2014 that simply requires one member of the Fed board to have community banking or state supervisory experience. Bowman was the first person selected to fill that role, and community bankers have appreciated the extent to which she has reached out to and advocated for their stances since joining the board.

Bowman's positions will likely draw fire from committee Democrats, who have used the confirmation process to highlight the Trump administration's deference to big business interests at what they see as the expense of consumers.

But committee ranking member Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass. — who has been sharply critical of many of the president's nominees — published a statement ahead of the hearing questioning Hurley's competence to serve in his nominated role, saying he has "not previously served in any governmental or non-governmental role that involves meaningful engagement with sanctions or illicit finance issues."

Hurley's nomination hearing comes after the Treasury Department on Wednesday afternoon announced it would roll back 15 rules and guidance materials "that placed significant burden on America's small businesses." The press materials did not specify which rules and guidances were included. The Treasury Department includes the Internal Revenue Service and Financial Crimes Enforcement Network.

Earlier Wednesday, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told the American Bankers Association that the department will play an expanded role in bank regulation compared to what it has done in the past. 

"The Treasury Department intends to drive a change in the culture of supervision through improvements to examination procedures, enhanced monitoring of examiners' compliance with those procedures, and more realistic processes for appealing supervisory findings," Bessent said. "Perhaps the most consequential step would be to define 'unsafe and unsound' by rule using more objective measures rooted in financial risk."