PROVIDING FOR CONGRESSIONAL DISAPPROVAL OF THE RULE SUBMITTED BY THE OFFICE OF THE COMPTROLLER OF THE CURRENCY OF THE DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY RELATING TO THE REVIEW OF APPLICATIONS UNDER THE...

On 2025-05-20, Representative Maxine Waters (D-CA-43) delivered a floor speech titled "PROVIDING FOR CONGRESSIONAL DISAPPROVAL OF THE RULE SUBMITTED BY THE OFFICE OF THE COMPTROLLER OF THE CURRENCY OF THE DE" in the House.

PROVIDING FOR CONGRESSIONAL DISAPPROVAL OF THE RULE SUBMITTED BY THE OFFICE OF THE COMPTROLLER OF THE CURRENCY OF THE DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY RELATING TO THE REVIEW OF APPLICATIONS UNDER THE...

Congressional Record, Volume 171 Issue 85 (Tuesday, May 20, 2025) [Congressional Record Volume 171, Number 85 (Tuesday, May 20, 2025)] [House] [Pages H2168-H2175] From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [ www.gpo.gov ] {time} 1415 PROVIDING FOR CONGRESSIONAL DISAPPROVAL OF THE RULE SUBMITTED BY THE OFFICE OF THE COMPTROLLER OF THE CURRENCY OF THE DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY RELATING TO THE REVIEW OF APPLICATIONS UNDER THE BANK MERGER ACT Mr. BARR. Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 426, I call up the joint resolution (S.J. Res. 13) providing for congressional disapproval under chapter 8 of title 5, United States Code, of the rule submitted by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency of the Department of the Treasury relating to the review of applications under the Bank Merger Act, and ask for its immediate consideration in the House. The Clerk read the title of the joint resolution. The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to House Resolution 426, the joint resolution is considered read. The text of the joint resolution is as follows: S.J. Res. 13 Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That Congress disapproves the rule submitted by the Office of [[Page H2169]] the Comptroller of the Currency of the Department of the Treasury relating to ``Business Combinations Under the Bank Merger Act'' (89 Fed. Reg. 78207 (September 25, 2024)), and such rule shall have no force or effect. The SPEAKER pro tempore. The joint resolution shall be debatable for 1 hour equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on Financial Services or their respective designees. The gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Barr) and the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Waters) each will control 30 minutes. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Kentucky. General Leave Mr. BARR. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on the resolution under consideration. The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the gentleman from Kentucky? There was no objection. Mr. BARR. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of this joint resolution of disapproval that would nullify the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency's final rule that makes it more difficult for banks to merge and merge in a healthy way. That is why I introduced the House companion, H.J. Res. 92. Today, we have the opportunity to prevent future administrations from issuing arbitrary rules on mergers and acquisitions that lack robust cost-benefit analysis and would make it significantly harder for financial institutions to grow and compete. Banks in the great Commonwealth of Kentucky and throughout the country are facing challenges in managing the high costs of complex regulations. Furthermore, customers now demand advanced technological features, such as mobile and online banking, which require substantial capital investments. Mergers often present the only viable path for these institutions to keep up with these regulatory and technological costs and continue serving their local communities. They also play a vital role in ensuring the safety and soundness of the financial system. By enabling stronger, well-managed institutions to acquire weaker ones, especially those struggling due to local economic conditions, we can prevent bank failures and the panic that they cause. Instead of making it harder for banks to merge, we should be eliminating outside obstacles to mergers, enhancing competition and innovation, and ensuring that Americans, especially those in rural and underserved communities, retain access to physical branches with employees who understand their local economies. That is why I introduced H.R. 1900, the Bank Failure Prevention Act, which includes a shot clock to ensure timely decisions on merger applications. Mr. Speaker, I come from Kentucky. It is a basketball-crazed Commonwealth, and we care about the shot clock. Congress should care about the shot clock on merger applications, as well. My bill would restore fairness and predictability, preventing delays and giving banks the stability they need to focus on serving their customers and growing their businesses. The Bank Failure Prevention Act will help community banks and regional banks thrive in today's competitive environment, providing for a shot clock on the review of those merger applications and providing better outcomes for consumers. I look forward to marking up this important legislation in the House Financial Services Committee this week. The OCC's merger rule under the Biden administration would have taken us in the exact opposite direction. It would have upended decades of precedent by shifting the burden onto banks to prove their merger should be approved rather than requiring the OCC to demonstrate how the merger conflicts with statutory factors. This would be fundamentally unfair, increasing confusion for banks seeking to merge and massively increasing the delay on the pendency and review of these applications without any kind of deadline on the review. Additionally, the rule would have abandoned expedited review for mergers for small, well-capitalized banks. Before the Biden-era regulation, there was an opportunity for expedited review of healthy mergers when there were small and well-capitalized institutions involved. Unfortunately, because of the Biden regulation, this resulted in a much more protracted process. Expedited reviews are essential to avoid prolonged, costly merger review processes that hinder banks from maintaining their employee base or investing in technology. Instead, long-drawn-out application processes create an environment of uncertainty due to regulatory delays, even when the proposed transaction is relatively simple. At the end of the day, Mr. Speaker, consumers are the ones who are hurt most when their banks are caught in limbo and forced to devote resources to navigate the merger process instead of enhancing their own products and services. The Democratic-led OCC rule was driven more by a progressive ideology against mergers in all sectors of all kinds in the economy rather than sound, rational policymaking. In fact, the Biden-Harris OCC did not even coordinate with the other banking regulators, such as the Federal Reserve Board, before issuing this final rule. Creating different merger rules for banks with different charters would add significant ambiguity for both banks and their customers. Thankfully, the current OCC under President Trump has recently indicated they will abandon this flawed rule. However, without this Congressional Review Act resolution, there is nothing to prevent a future administration from reintroducing this damaging rule that would prevent healthy, beneficial mergers from occurring. Community and regional banks, as well as their customers, should not have to fear that the rules will change dramatically in a few years. Mr. Speaker, I can already anticipate the argument from my good friend from California. I know what she is going to say here in just a few minutes. She is going to say: Look at the Republicans. They are supporting mergers of big, bad banks, and that hurts Americans. To the contrary, Mr. Speaker. Allowing healthy mergers to prevent bank failures allows for healthy financial institutions to compete with the big Wall Street banks. If you want more competition for big Wall Street banks, you should support this resolution of disapproval because you are going to create stronger competitors to the big Wall Street banks. Opposing this resolution, like the gentlewoman and ranking member of our committee is about ready to do, is defending the regulatory moat that protects big banks from real competition. The Democrats' opposition here is defending big banks without competition, and that is why I urge all of my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to support healthy competition to prevent bank failures and to disapprove of this unwise regulation from the Biden administration. Mr. Speaker, I urge all of my colleagues to support this resolution and prevent the regulatory whipsaw that has proven so detrimental for banking institutions and the American people who rely on them. I reserve the balance of my time. Ms. WATERS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I am so pleased that the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Barr) referred to me because the big banks hate me. They love him. They support him. They don't support me. Let's see whose side he is on. As a matter of fact, he is here talking about not being in support of big bank mergers because he is trying so hard to get more community banks. We need more community banks, but he is a long way from getting what he is talking about. The fact is, we really do need them because of the big bank mergers. One of the things he could do to increase having community banks that relate to the neighborhoods and relate to the people in the communities is to stop allowing these big mergers to take place. I rise to express my opposition to S.J. Res. 13, a Congressional Review Act resolution that would rescind a rule the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency has put forth to improve their bank merger application review procedures. [[Page H2170]] Consumer groups, experts, and I have long rung the alarm bell as the Federal Government rubberstamped bank mergers for decades to the detriment of competition. The result has been a growing number of banking deserts where communities lack even one bank branch. Let's see what happens after a merger. Mr. Speaker, I want the gentleman to listen to me. I want him to know what happens after the big bank mergers. They close branches. They close down branches all throughout the communities. They lay off the workers. They need less workers, a

Referenced legislation: SJRES13, SJRES13, HJRES92, HRES426, HR1900