By David Morgan
-Senate Democrats and Banking Committee members Jon Tester and Mark Warner on Monday said they will both vote to confirm President Joe Biden’s slate of nominees to the Federal Reserve, including Sarah Bloom Raskin as the Fed’s top bank regulator.
The two moderate Democrats confirmed their intentions to Reuters ahead of a scheduled Banking Committee vote on the matter scheduled for Tuesday afternoon.
“I’m going to support them,” Tester, a Montana Democrat, told Reuters.
“I’m for them,” echoed Warner, who represents Virginia. Warner added he is confident committee Chairman Sherrod Brown of Ohio “can get this done.”
Support for Biden’s five nominees, including Jerome Powell for a second term as chair, is varied. Raskin, nominated as vice chair for supervision, is seen as facing the narrowest path to confirmation, one that could require the support of every Democrat in the closely divided Senate.
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The first step in that process is Tuesday afternoon’s vote by the 24-member banking panel, split evenly between Democrats and Republicans. Most of the nominees are expected to pick up one or more Republican votes, but Republicans have been particularly critical of Raskin for past remarks on using financial rules to police climate change.
(Reporting by David Morgan;Writing by Dan BurnsEditing by Leslie Adler and Sam Holmes)