Waters Blasts Inclusion of Wall Street Deregulation Measures in FSGG Appropriations Bill

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Today, Congresswoman Maxine Waters (D-CA), Ranking Member of the Committee on Financial Services, blasted the FY 2018 Financial Services and General Government (FSGG) Appropriations bill, which includes many elements of the Wrong Choice Act, the Republican deregulatory measure to roll back Wall Street reform.

“The Financial Services and General Government Appropriations bill has been poisoned with many of the most dangerous parts of the Wrong Choice Act, which would pave the way to another financial crisis,” said Ranking Member Waters. “House Republicans are going to new lengths for Wall Street by inappropriately plugging these vastly consequential and harmful deregulatory provisions into a government funding bill in violation of House rules. The inclusion of these measures, which would lead to disaster to Main Street, is outrageous and completely unacceptable.”

The Wrong Choice Act provisions in the FSGG Appropriations bill would:

• Completely gut the highly successful the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (Consumer Bureau).
  
• Weaken financial stability safeguards, such as stress tests and living wills for the largest banks.
  
• Repeal merger and acquisition restrictions for mega banks, accelerating industry consolidation trends that will decrease the number of community banks and will allow the largest banks to grow without consideration for systemic risk.
  
• Repeal the Volcker Rule, which stops banks from gambling with taxpayer money.
  
• Subject federal financial regulatory agencies to the annual appropriations process.
  
• Repeal the Financial Stability Oversight Council’s (FSOC) ability to designate non-bank financial firms, like AIG, as systemically important financial institutions (SIFIs) for purposes of enhanced supervision and regulation.
  
• Abolish the Office of Financial Research (OFR), which collects data and provides valuable research and analysis to help the FSOC identify and stop risks to U.S. financial stability.
  
• Revoke bipartisan compromises on 16 bills from the past three Congressional terms, removing important investor protections and creating potential loopholes in securities and consumer protection laws.
  
  

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