WASHINGTON — Unlike most recent congressional recesses, this past summer’s break has seen some key financial policy news as bank regulators finalized a pivotal rule rolling back the Volcker Rule.
But when lawmakers return from their late-summer break on Sept. 9, there are a host of other unresolved financial services issues facing them, including efforts to let bankers serve the marijuana industry to reforms of anti-money-laundering requirements.
Late last week, House Financial Services Committee Chairwoman Maxine Waters, D-Calif., outlined her panel’s priorities for the fall, including oversight of Trump-appointed banking regulators and reviewing Facebook’s proposed cryptocurrency. The committee will also consider solutions to increase access to homeownership, explore data privacy and the use of artificial intelligence in financial services and examine the state of minority depository institutions, among other things, Waters said in a press release.
It is unclear if Congress will be able advance any of these initiatives, with the 2020 presidential primaries fast approaching and the nation focused on more polarizing cultural issues. But the end of the August recess gives the industry a chance to continue engaging with lawmakers on legislative priorities.
After Democrats took control of the House, banks got their first hearing on a bill aimed at enabling the industry to serve marijuana businesses in the states where the substance is legal, without fear of repercussion from regulators.
The House Financial Services Committee passed the SAFE Banking Act, which would prohibit federal regulators to penalize firms that accepts insured deposits from state-approved cannabis businesses, in a 45-15 vote, with all of the committee’s Democrats joined by 11 Republicans in support of the legislation.
The Republican-controlled Senate has been viewed as an obstacle for cannabis banking, but the industry got a hearing in the Senate Banking Committee in July over the challenges for banks posed by the conflict between the federal ban on marijuana and state legalization efforts.
Though Banking Committee Chairman Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, was the only Republican to attend the hearing, the industry is optimistic that Congress will provide them clarity on whether they can serve state-approved cannabis businesses.
“We are very much focused on trying to get the bipartisan cannabis bill through the House,” said James Ballentine, executive vice president for political affairs and congressional relations at the American Bankers Association. “We were very supportive and interested in the Senate hearing that took place in July and certainly the questions that members asked demonstrated a lot of interest in this issue.”
However, it will likely still be a challenge to get a Senate committee vote on any cannabis-related legislation as some Republicans are sitting out the debate until their primaries are over.
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