A congressional bill is attempting to change how the insurance industry is regulated in America.
U.S. Senator Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), along with Senators Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Mike Lee (R-UT), reintroduced the Federal Insurance Office Abolishment Act, which would eliminate the U.S. Treasury Department’s Federal Insurance Office (FIO), removing the federal office responsible for monitoring and coordinating federal insurance policy.
Even with the elimination of the FIO, the bill would not repeal or limit the Treasury Department’s insurance-related authority.
The bill would amend the 2010 Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, which Congress passed after the 2008 financial crisis to reform America’s financial system.
References to the FIO director in the Dodd-Frank Act addressing federal financial regulators would, in certain provisions, be replaced with references to the treasury secretary.
Furthermore, references to the FIO director in the Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief, and Consumer Protection Act would be removed, leaving the treasury secretary and Federal Reserve Board identified in those provisions.
This act was passed in 2018 to relax certain regulations from the Dodd-Frank Act.
According to the bill’s sponsors, these changes would make states the sole regulatory authority over the insurance industry.
“Insurance regulation has long been, and should remain, a responsibility of the states,” Blackburn said. “The Federal Insurance Office Abolishment Act would eliminate unnecessary federal overreach, cut red tape, and return power to the states.”
Cruz said the FIO is “a redundant, ever-expanding, unaccountable entity that infringes upon states’ authority to regulate the insurance industry.”
“This legislation will rein in bureaucratic overreach by the federal government and empower state regulators to focus on what is best for consumers in their states,” he added.
Lee said the FIO “does not need to exist.”
“It’s an Obama-era expansion of the federal bureaucracy created to intrude on states’ rights,” the senator said.
“Our bill will formally abolish this needless expense and return insurance regulation to the states, where it has always belonged,” he added.
This marks the fifth time the bill has been introduced in Congress since 2017.
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Zachery Schmidt is the digital editor of The Star News Network. Email tips to Zachery at [email protected].
Photo “Marsha Blackburn” by Marsha Blackburn. Photo “Mike Lee” by Mike Lee. Photo “Ted Cruz” by Ted Cruz.
