In yet another sharp policy clash with House Financial Services Chairman Jeb Hensarling (R-Texas), panel ranking Democrat Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) told federal agencies today that she considers her communications with them subject to federal open records statutes.
“I have long understood that my and my staff’s communications with executive branch agencies are subject to [ Freedom of Information Act] disclosure barring an explicit assertion on my part to retain control over such documents,” she said in letters to at least three federal agencies—the NCUA , the CFPB, and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency.
Hensarling recently told agencies under the committee’s jurisdiction that he wanted to keep his communications with them private in an effort to ensure the “unfettered flow of information necessary to assist the Committee in performing its important legislative and oversight functions.”
Hensarling and Waters have sharply clashed over the chairman’s Financial CHOICE Act. Hensarling has said his plan to repeal much of Dodd-Frank would provide financial institutions with much-needed regulatory relief.
Waters has charged that the 2008 financial crisis made it clear that consumers needed better protection and that Hensarling’s bill would destroy those protections.
In her letters to the agencies, Waters said that the NCUA and OCC have chosen to comply with Hensarling’s request, while the CFPB is complying “in part.”
NCUA Public Affairs Specialist John Fairbanks confirmed that the agency has complied with Hensarling’s request.
And Waters said that Hensarling does not speak for her.
“While Chairman Hensarling has chosen to make this assertion, I want to be clear that he does not speak on my behalf in this instance,” she wrote.
After Hensarling sent his letter, Waters charged that it “is the height of hypocrisy for him to take such extraordinary measures to shield himself from the oversight of the American public. People should ask themselves: what is he trying to hide?”
Hensarling said that Waters was aware of his request and that she had not chosen to express her outrage until his letters were made public.
