May 22, 2018

U.S. House of Representatives
Washington, D.C. 20515

Dear Representative,

You will soon consider S. 2155, the Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief, and Consumer Protection Act, sponsored by Sen. Mike Crapo (R-Idaho). On behalf of the more than one million members and supporters of the Council for Citizens Against Government Waste (CCAGW), I urge you to support this legislation.

Since Congress passed the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act in 2010, credit unions and community banks have continually been undermined and hampered by excessive federal regulations. Instead of helping small businesses, Dodd-Frank has disproportionately benefited large banks, stifled main street economic growth, shrunk the number of community banks, and consequently, hurt working-class families. Another debilitating Dodd-Frank creation was the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), a federal agency subject to little Congressional oversight with the unbridled capacity to propose mountains of onerous new regulations. House Committee on Financial Services Chairman Jeb Hensarling (R-Texas) has called the CFPB “the most destructive and dangerous of the new regulatory bureaucracies.”

S. 2155 will provide vital regulatory relief for community banks and small business. This legislation would exempt banks with less than $10 billion in assets from many burdensome and feckless regulations, chief among them being the Volcker Rule, which limits small banks from engaging in short-term proprietary trading and dealing with hedge funds or covered funds. S. 2155 also provides a more accurate threshold for the Financial Stability Oversight Council to label banks and other firms as systematically important financial institutions, or “too big to fail,” from $50 billion to $250 billion.

On March 14, 2018, the Senate passed S. 2155 by a bipartisan vote of 67-31. CCAGW urges the House to do the same in order to roll back Dodd-Frank’s regulatory stranglehold, help community banks gain access to capital for their customers, and spark stronger economic growth. All votes on S. 2155 will be among those considered for CCAGW’s 2018 Congressional Ratings.

Sincerely,

Tom Schatz
President, CCAGW

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