Philip Jefferson, whose nomination for
Jefferson, the second Black person to be nominated to serve as the central bank's vice chair, appeared before the Senate panel for a nomination hearing.
He was joined by Lisa Cook, a member of the Federal Reserve's Board of Governors who is nominated for a new 14-year term after her current one expires in January, and Adriana Kugler, an economist who is nominated for a vacant Fed governor position.
Democratic lawmakers touted the diversity of President Biden's nominations. Cook is the first Black woman to serve on the Board of Governors. And Kugler, a U.S. representative to the World Bank, would be the first Latina to serve on the board.
"In the 110-year history of the Federal Reserve, there has never been a member of the Board of Governors who has the lived experience of being Latino in America," said Sen. Bob Menendez, D-N.J. "Not once. And so today, we are taking momentous steps and are writing history in real time."
The nominations come as Michael Barr, the Fed's bank policy chief,
Jefferson, who would be the second-highest ranking official at the Fed,
"As we think about capital requirements, I will always be thinking about that trade-off between making banks more resilient and sound and credit availability," Jefferson said. "I think we have to deal with always grappling with the trade-offs between those two things in setting the right level of capital."
Jefferson similarly avoided directly committing to further changes in the Fed's stance on bank merger policy — an increasingly hot-button issue in Washington as bank regulators and the
"We don't want too much consolidation," Jefferson said, though he also did not clearly endorse the idea that regulators should strengthen merger guidelines.
