The White House says it asked Senate Democrats for names to fill empty commissioner seats at the SEC and CFTC — and got nothing back.
In a Thursday letter to Senate leaders John Thune and Chuck Schumer, officials said they’d already solicited Democratic nominees for both agencies. Right now, the SEC has three Republican commissioners and two vacant Democratic seats. The CFTC has one chair (Republican Michael Selig) and no other commissioners at all.
The letter was a response to a June 10 request from 12 Democratic senators worried about staffing at federal agencies. They called it a “sharp break from precedent” that the White House wasn’t engaging with them on nominations.
This matters because the CLARITY Act — a crypto market structure bill that passed the House last year — is still pending in the Senate. It needs 60 votes, which means it’ll need some Democrats on board. Having empty seats at the agencies that would enforce the rules doesn’t exactly build confidence.
CFTC Chair Selig said Wednesday that without bipartisan legislation, regulators like him end up “writing all the rules” — and he’s pretty sure Democrats would rather have a say in that.
