WASHINGTON–Rep. Any Barr (R-KY), who chairs the Financial Institutions Subcommittee of the House Financial Services Committee, said he favors legislation that would tailor federal bank regulation to financial institutions’ risk profiles.

He said he also supports Congress’ authority over the federal banking regulatory agencies, even as the Trump administration has exerted control.

Barr’s comments came in his prepared remarks during a hearing in the House that was meant to examine approaches for increasing accountability in bank supervision and enhancing interagency coordination.

‘Inconsistency & Lack of Clarity’

“I’ve heard from community bankers across the country about the inconsistency and lack of clarity in the supervision and examination framework being driven by partisan bureaucrats in Washington,” Barr said in his remarks at the hearing. “Rather than our prudential regulators working alongside supervised institutions to ensure compliance, we have seen a shift to promoting agendas such as climate-related finance or the debanking of legally operating businesses — dangerous deviations from the core mission and purpose of these agencies.”

According to Barr, the Dodd-Frank Act that was passed in the wake of the financial crisis 15 years ago imposed a “one-size-fits-all” approach on community banks that imposed unnecessary compliance costs on institutions that did not contribute to the financial crisis.

‘Abandoned’ Approach

Barr said the bipartisan Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief and Consumer Protection Act of 2018 sought to recalibrate federal bank regulations to take a more risk-based approach and remove excessive compliance burdens from smaller FIs, but he said the approach was abandoned under the Biden administration when regulatory officials pushed for Basel III endgame.

Barr’s comments came during a hearing titled, “Regulatory Overreach: The Price Tag on American Prosperity.”