A bipartisan group of senators are introducing a bill that would subject regional Federal Reserve banks to Freedom of Information Act requests, a bill
The bill, led this time by Warren and Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., would subject the regional Fed banks to FOIA requests and strengthen Congress' ability to request information from the Fed banks, including providing some members of the Senate Banking Committee and the House Financial Services Committee the right to request supervisory information.
The bill would also make the Fed Inspector General a Senate-confirmed position.
Warren and Toomey previously introduced a version of the bill in December 2022, after Toomey said he had multiple instances where he requested—but did not receive—information from the reserve banks during the past two years. More recently, he sought information from the Kansas City Fed on why it granted, and later revoked, a master account to the Greenwood Village, Colorado-based digital-asset firm Reserve Trust. Prior to this, he had submitted requests to the reserve banks in Minneapolis, Boston, Atlanta and San Francisco about their efforts to expand their research beyond topics directly related to monetary policy. None of these banks provided the requested information either.
Currently, in the aftermath of the failure of Silicon Valley Bank, which was overseen by the San Francisco Fed, the regional Fed banks are facing increased scrutiny.
"More and more lawmakers are troubled by the Fed's key role in the recent bank failures, and this bipartisan bill underscores the momentum in Congress for enhanced transparency measures to hold Fed officials accountable for their actions," Warren said in a statement. "After the largest ethics scandal in the history of the Federal Reserve System and now a failed multibillion dollar bank under its watch, the Fed cannot ignore congressional oversight and stonewall the American people."
The legislation fits in neatly with Republican efforts to paint the bank collapses as supervisory failures, which they argue would omit the need for tougher regulation of midsize banks.
"Congress must have a clear understanding of what regulatory and supervisory failures occurred to allow the collapse of both Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) and Signature Bank," Tillis said in a statement. "It is clear to me the Fed made mistakes and greater transparency is needed to determine what went wrong so we can ensure that it doesn't happen again. I'm proud to introduce this bipartisan legislation, which advances Federal Reserve transparency and accountability, while still maintaining crucial Fed independence over monetary policy decisions."
The bill is one of several bipartisan agreements emerging in response to federal regulators stepping in to save depositors of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank a few weeks ago. Another potential area of bipartisan compromise, executive clawback provisions, is also the subject of
