Correction: The original article misidentified the sponsors of a bill to subject the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to the congressional appropriations process. The bill was only introduced by Rep. Randy Neugebauer.
President Obama bumped up his proposed budgets for the agencies charged with implementing the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial reform law. It’s wishful thinking on his part. History indicates that the agency budgets are unlikely to make it through Congress without significant cuts. Since Dodd-Frank, the Securities and Exchange Commission, Commodity Futures Trading Commission, and Consumer Financial Protection Bureau have been targets for Republican criticism - and budget cuts.
On Monday, President Obama proposed an 11 percent increase in funding for the SEC, to $1.57 billion up from $1.41 billion last year. He requested the same level of funding for the CFTC. Both the SEC and CFTC saw their budgets slashed by Congress last year, with the SEC receiving $1.3 billion and the CFTC $205 million, down from Obama’s requested $308 million.
Obama estimated that the CFPB would require $448 million in 2013, an increase of $118 million from the previous year. The CFPB is not subject to the congressional appropriations process; it is funded by the Federal Reserve and can tap up to 12 percent of the central bank’s total operating budget. But its funding may also be in jeopardy. A new bill, introduced by Rep. Randy Neugebauer, R-Texas, would subject the bureau to the regular Treasury Department appropriations process - and thus congressional approval.
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