WASHINGTON, D.C. – The Republican members of the Senate
Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee today released a letter to the
conferees of the financial services reform legislation recently approved by the
Senate, outlining their opposition to the inclusion of expanded Federal Trade
Commission (FTC) authority in the Restoring American Financial Stability Act of
2010. The letter was signed by every
Republican member of the Committee, including Ranking Member Kay Bailey
Hutchison (R-Texas), and Senators Roger Wicker (R-Miss.), Olympia Snowe
(R-Maine), John Ensign (R-Nev.), Jim DeMint (R-S.C.), John Thune (R-S.D.), George
S. LeMieux (R-Fla.), Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.), David Vitter (R-La.), Sam
Brownback (R-Kan.), and Mike Johanns (R-Neb.). The FTC expansions were not
included in the Senate-passed version of the bill, but were in the legislation
approved by the House, and are scheduled to be debated by the conferees.
June 21, 2010
As you prepare the Conference Report for the “Restoring
American Financial Stability Act of 2010,” we strongly urge you not to
adopt the expansions of Federal Trade Commission (FTC) authority included in
section 4901 of the House-passed version of H.R. 4173. Among other
things, these expansions would remove important checks on the FTC’s rulemaking
authority and eliminate current provisions requiring coordination with the
Department of Justice. These changes were not included in the
Senate-passed bill, and were not debated in the Senate, yet they would impact
thousands of U.S. businesses of all sizes that had no connection whatsoever to
the country’s financial meltdown.
During Senate debate on H.R. 4173, Commerce Committee
Chairman Rockefeller and Ranking Member Hutchison sponsored a bipartisan
amendment to preserve the FTC’s authority under the Federal Trade Commission
Act, notwithstanding the creation of a new consumer financial protection
agency. The Rockefeller-Hutchison amendment was accepted by voice
vote. By contrast, we believe the House-passed provisions expanding the
FTC’s authority would have faced substantial opposition in the Senate. While
our Committee has held two hearings this Congress at which the FTC expansions
were discussed, to date, there has been no debate or vote taken on specific
legislative text. We believe that such significant changes to current law
require proper consideration, through regular order, instead of being included
in a largely unrelated piece of legislation without ample debate.
Therefore, we respectfully request that these FTC expansions
be kept out of the final Conference Report, to allow the Committees of
jurisdiction to give them the consideration they deserve.
Sincerely,
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