Democrats Seek Probe of Acting SEC Chair
In a letter dated March 29, four Democratic members of the Senate Banking Committee asked the SEC’s inspector general to investigate whether its acting chair (Michael Piwowar) has exceeded his authority in directing staff to review two Obama-era rules.
The two actions in question are;
1. Piwowar’s request that the SEC staff to review prior compliance guidance on the conflict minerals rule to determine if “additional relief” is appropriate.
2. directing the staff to reconsider the implementation of the CEO pay rule which would require public companies to compare CEO pay to that of its average employee.
The four senators said Piwowar had engaged in “a major exertion of authority for a position usually seen as a short-term caretaker” and his “personal distaste for a congressional mandate is not sufficient grounds to attempt to weaken a final rule that has been approved by the SEC.”
The senators (including Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), Sherrod Brown Ranking Member (D-OH), Robert Menendez (D-NJ), and Brian Schatz (D-HI)) asked the SEC’s inspector general to “conduct an investigation into each of these decisions to determine whether they are legally permissible and in keeping with the SEC’s core mission.”
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