A bipartisan effort to pair two Securities and Exchange Commission nominees might get the thumbs down from Democrats on the Senate Banking Committee.
Sens. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Bob Menendez (D-N.J) said Tuesday they would consider voting against both picks due to the nominees’ skepticism of an initiative that would force companies to disclose campaign contributions.
“I’m not satisfied with either answer. I’m putting you folks on notice,” Schumer told Lisa Fairfax and Hester Maria Peirce at their confirmation hearing. The former is a Democratic nominee; the latter, a Republican nominee. Menedez said he had “the same reservations Sen. Schumer has,” after his own round of questioning.
On Tuesday, the Wall Street Journal noted that Fairfax and Peirce would likely both be approved “due to the tradition of maintaining partisan balance on the five member commission.” The SEC has five seats; two of them are currently vacant. At the end of the confirmation hearing, however, the path forward for the pair seemed less certain.
Public Citizen, a prominent public interest group based in Washington, detailed significant concerns from the minority side. “Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio)…and Jack Reed (D-R.I.) all [additionally] spent significant time at the hearing calling for this information to be required as a part of the SEC’s disclosure regime for investors,” it said.
Fairfax and Peirce had said they’d have to examine specifics of any draft regulation on campaign finance disclosure requirements for publicly-traded companies. They also noted a year-long ban on the commission from making any such rule. It was passed by Congress in late 2015.
“Sitting on the outside, I can’t know how I’d vote,” Fairax said. Peirce echoed this, saying: “I would need to know what the actual text of the disclosure requirement was.”
Critics of the move to force disclosure have said it doesn’t quite jive with the SEC’s mission to protect investors—said to be non-germane, when formulating investment strategy. Menendez and Schumer hit out at that claim on Tuesday.
“That argument, that it’s immaterial, doesn’t cut much mustard with me,” Schumer said. “And, I think, with many shareholders.”
“I want to invest in a company that is ultimately going to make its greatest profits and, from my perspective as one shareholder, to also make sure they are doing so within the amenable law and as a good corporate citizen,” Menendez said.
“If I wanna go spend money in a campaign, I can spend my money in a campaign, and I’ll decide where it goes.” he added. “I have no interest in having a corporation spend the money that, in part, is mine–by virtue of my investments—in whomever they want, or whatever they want.”
Brown, the ranking member, told nominees that the ongoing presidential primary contests demonstrate a palpable bottom-up cry for Washington to combat influence peddling.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) is mounting a once-considered improbable challenge of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton—in part, by decrying campaign finance rules and Clinton’s ties to Corporate America, while refusing to take donations from big business. On the right side of the equation, meanwhile, Donald Trump has been buoyed by Republican voters, in part, because he boasts of self-financing his bid.
“I hope you listen to some of the outrage from this committee and this country,” Brown said.
