House Financial Services Committee Chairman Spencer Bachus Wednesday plans to introduce a bill that would put a five-member commission at the helm of the nation's new consumer-watchdog agency.
The panel would replace the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau director, a position that hasn't been filled yet.
"Because the CFPB might be the most powerful agency ever created, I am introducing this bill to ensure that a nonpartisan, balanced approach to consumer protection prevails," said Bachus, an Alabama Republican.
The consumer bureau was created as part of the sweeping Dodd-Frank financial overhaul Congress passed last summer. The agency would have the power to write new consumer-protection laws that would affect the nation's largest banks.
At an oversight hearing Wednesday, House Republicans argued that the bureau has too much sway over credit markets and financial products and suggested that the bureau should be run by a commission, not a single director.
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