On the recordNovember 8, 2023
This amendment would repeal the subpoena authority of the Treasury's Federal Insurance Office. Additionally, it removes the subpoena authority of the Office of Financial Research. For over 150 years, State insurance regulators and the law as passed by those State legislatures have regulated insurance companies, and it has worked out very well. The Federal Insurance Office, FIO, created under Dodd-Frank, has grown increasingly aggressive in collecting data from insurance companies, most recently issuing a proposed data collection to assess ``climate-related financial risk.'' Despite working with State regulators on previous efforts, FIO intentionally chose not to collaborate with State regulators on this climate data call. Not only has the office been unclear with how they intend to use the data they collect, but the effort would be duplicative in many ways as many States already collect a similar but maybe not exact set of data, as required by the Federal Government. Mr. Chair, any efforts by Treasury or FIO to sidestep State insurance regulators blatantly undermine congressional intent. That is why I introduced the Insurance Data Protection Act to repeal FIO's subpoena power. The amendment would have the same effect as the bill, and I am pleased many of my colleagues have supported that. Mr. Chair, I urge my colleagues to vote ``yes'' on this amendment, and I reserve the balance of my time.
