The Biden administration will be looking at more regulations, stirring action from business lobbyists in financial services, agribusiness, medical-device makers and others, The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported Monday (Feb. 7).
The groups are responding to what some have said is the “most concerted regulatory push” since the Obama administration.
The White House’s newly installed chiefs at multiple regulatory agencies have a long list of new rules, according to the report, with measures seeking to address climate change and workplace diversity and others looking to cut down Wall Street’s ability to rake in millions.
The regulators also want to address credit card and banking fee reductions, and consumer protection agencies have pushed to cut corporate consolidation, particularly in Silicon Valley and Wall Street.
Agencies have also been looking into new health and safety regulations for a variety of industries like medical devices, railroads and interstate gas pipelines.
Business has responded with more lobbying. Ken Spain, a strategist coordinating the industry defense, said there’s “growing concern within the business community that there has been a rush to regulate without fully factoring in the negative effects on industry and the economy.”
“With the election year upon us and the administration’s agenda stalling, the pace is expected to accelerate,” he said, per WSJ.
A Biden nominee for the Federal Reserve, Sarah Bloom Raskin, has faced critiques from conservative lawmakers over her policies for combating climate change, a sticking point for conservatives.
Related: Fed Nominee Raskin Faces Grilling From GOP Lawmakers
In the past, Raskin, a longtime Washington policy advocate, has been vocally opposed to the fossil fuel industry.
At her hearing for Biden’s Federal Reserve post, she tried to distance herself from the anti-fossil fuel writings, but the GOP members of the panel weren’t convinced. Republican Sen. Patrick Toomey said she “doesn’t acknowledge the contradiction of what she has said today compared to the things she has been saying and writing for years.”
Raskin’s past writing included recommending the Fed not bail out big energy during the pandemic.
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