The Biden administration said Friday it planned to nominate Michael S. Barr, a law professor and a former Obama administration official, as the Federal Reserve’s vice chairman for oversight.
The position – one of America’s most important financial regulatory spots – has proven particularly difficult to fill.
The administration’s first nominee, Sarah Bloom Raskin, failed to win Senate confirmation after Republicans disagreed with her writing on climate-related financial oversight and seized her limited answers about her work in the private sector. West Virginia Democrat Joe Manchin III, Democrat, joined Republicans in the decision not to support her, ending her chances.
Mr. Barr, the dean of the University of Michigan’s public policy school, could also face challenges in gaining widespread support. He was one of the top contenders for nomination as currency controller, but met opposition from progressive Democrats.
Some of the complaints related to his work in the government: As a Treasury Department official during the Obama administration, Mr. Barr was instrumental in drafting the Dodd-Frank Act, which changed financial regulation after the financial crisis. of 2008 renewed. But some said he was against some particularly tough measures for major banks.
Other opponents when his name was mentioned for that post focused on his work in the private sector with the financial technology and cryptocurrency industry.
But President Biden described Mr. Barr as a qualified candidate who would bring years of experience to the job.
“Barr has strong support from across the political spectrum,” the president said in a statement announcing the decision. He noted that Mr. Barr had been confirmed to his position with the Treasury “on a bipartisan basis”.
Senator Sherrod Brown, the Ohio Democrat who chairs the Senate Banking Committee, said in a statement: “I will support this key candidate and strongly urge my Republican colleagues to abandon their old playbook of personal attacks and demagoguery. .”
Ian Katz, director of research and consulting firm Capital Alpha, estimated the likelihood of Mr. Barr’s confirmation at 60 percent. “Barr is seen by many as more moderate than Sarah Bloom Raskin,” Mr Katz wrote in a note ahead of the announcement, but following speculation that Mr Barr could be elected.
Mr. Barr completes Mr. Biden’s list of candidates for the central bank’s five open positions.
The other picks — Jerome H. Powell for another term as Fed chairman, Lael Brainard for vice chairman, and Lisa D. Cook and Philip N. Jefferson for board seats — await confirmation. Those nominations are past the Senate Banking Committee, the first step toward confirmation, and a full Senate vote is expected in the coming weeks.
Mr Biden said he would work with the committee to get Mr Barr through his first vote quickly, and he called for swift confirmation from the others.