Frank, Waxman ironing out differences over financial regulatory agency

Reps. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) and Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) are close to resolving their disagreement over how to structure a new federal agency to regulate consumer financial products.

The split emerged in late October with Frank, chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, favoring a single director for the new Consumer Financial Protection Agency (CFPA). Meanwhile, Waxman, chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, supports having a commission in charge.

Steve Adamske, Frank's spokesman, said that the two chairmen are working on a compromise to have a director in place for a period of time, possibly two years, while the commission gets up and running and commissioners are named.

"We want to get the commission up and running," Adamske said.

The full House is planning next week to take up wide-ranging financial overhaul legislation, one of President Barack Obama's top domestic priorities. The structure of the new regulatory agency is one of several issues that Frank and other lawmakers are attempting to resolve before next week.
 
Waxman and other members of Energy and Commerce had argued that having a commission with members serving staggered terms would reduce the influence of the political party in power at the time. Frank has long supported a single director with a powerful role to sit at the same table as the nation's other regulatory bodies.

Frank has said he would like to see the agency run by Elizabeth Warren, the Harvard law professor who first started talking about the agency idea. Republicans and the financial industry have criticized Warren.

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