Ron Paul's push for full Fed audit slated for House vote

One of Rep. Ron Paul's (R-Texas) pet issues will hit the spotlight this July, as House Republican leaders plan to hold a vote on authorizing a top-to-bottom audit of the Federal Reserve.

In a memo to Republican members sent Friday, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) unveiled the GOP majority's plan for the months leading up to the fall elections. Among a "busy legislative agenda," including bills tackling healthcare, domestic energy production and taxes, Paul's 300-word measure has carved out a spot on the docket.

The bill is currently pending before a House Oversight subcommittee, but has garnered a substantial number of sponsors — 227 in all, including several committee chairmen. And while Fed-bashing became a popular activity on the GOP primary campaign trail, not all the bill's backers are Republicans. Several Democrats, such as Reps. Peter DeFazio (Ore.) and Dennis Kucinich (Ohio), are among those pushing for a Fed audit.

The central bank's activities have come under heightened scrutiny ever since the financial crisis. Republican lawmakers have argued that the Fed's efforts to boost the economy via rock-bottom interest rates and two rounds of massive bond-buying known as "quantitative easing" are encouraging inflation. And members in both parties have expressed concern about the outsized role the Fed took on during the financial crisis, extending huge amounts of loans in a bid to keep the financial system afloat.

The Fed was previously audited by the Government Accountability Office under a provision of the Dodd-Frank financial reform law. However, that survey was limited to just the Fed's actions during the financial crisis, which revealed the central bank loaned trillions to the world's largest financial institutions as Wall Street teetered.

Under Paul's bill, the entire operations of the Fed would be examined and publicized.

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