United States Representative Tom Emmer spoke out against Securities and Exchange Commission Chair Gary Gensler during a hearing at the House Financial Services Committee on Sept. 27. According to the lawmaker, Gensler has been loyal to Wall Street “at the clear expense of innovation, competition, and everyday Americans.”
Over four minutes of questioning, Emmer hinted at Gensler’s background in finance, which included 18 years with Goldman Sachs, where he was a partner and co-head of finance. As per Emmer’s view, Gensler’s ties to the financial industry limit his ability to be an impartial regulator. He said:
“But given your 18-year career at one of the biggest banks in the world and the personal financial fortune you amassed there, do you think it’s possible for you to serve as an impartial regulator and not favor large financial intermediaries?”
According to a transcript of the hearing, Emmer went on to say:
“And to be clear sir, this perspective has nothing to do with a concern you noted in a speech last year where you said, quote, ‘Over the past year, several bank executives have shared their concerns with me about the sheer number of depositors who have moved money from their bank accounts into crypto-related exchanges and wallets,’ end quote, right?”
Gensler was asked to answer all questions with a yes or no response without being allowed to make further comments. In response to the first question about being able to regulate impartially, Gensler said, “Absolutely, sir.” In response to the second question, Gensler tried to contextualize his quote but was not allowed to proceed.
Representative Emmer has been positioning himself as a crypto advocate, pushing for regulatory clarity in the United States during the SEC crackdown on crypto firms that began in 2022 following the collapse of crypto exchange FTX. A look at Emmer’s top financial contributors between 2021–2022 reveals venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz, a leading investor in the crypto space. According to data available on Open Secrets, donations to Emmer from the securities and investment industries stood at $418,020.
During the hearing, Representative Patrick McHenry also suggested the SEC could be subpoenaed over documents related to former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried. According to McHenry, Gensler made efforts to “choke off the digital asset ecosystem” in addition to “refus[ing] to be transparent with Congress” in connections between the commission, FTX and Bankman-Fried.
Bitfinex CTO Paolo Ardoino explained that if the hacking group was telling the truth, they would have asked for a ransom, but he “couldn’t find any request.”
The symbolism of Labour taking the West Midlands mayor, a jewel in the Tory crown, could be felt in the room as Labour activists gathered in Birmingham to celebrate the win with their new mayor Richard Parker and Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer.
There are moments on election journeys when the momentum shifts – and this win felt like one of them.
“We humbly asked [the voters] to put their trust and confidence in a changed Labour Party and they did. And that is a significant piece of political history that we’ve made here today,” said Sir Keir at his victory rally.
“So the message out of these elections, the last now the last stop before we go into that general election, is that the country wants change.
“I hope the prime minister is listening and gives the opportunity to the country to vote as a whole in a general election as soon as possible.”
This win gave them the boost that was missing when they won the Blackpool South by-election on a massive 26-point swing, but then failed to pick up the hundreds of council seats they were chasing.
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This win, on just 1,508 votes or 0.25 per cent of the vote, was a body blow for a Conservative party that believed they could just about cling on. Ben Houchen, the Tees Valley mayor, is now the last Tory standing.
For Labour, then a moment to bookmark.
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Just as Boris Johnson’s Hartlepool by-election win in 2021 was a low point for Sir Keir – he told me this week that he considered resigning over the loss because he thought it showed he was the barrier to Labour’s recovery – this too will feel devastating not just for Andy Street but for the PM too.
Labour has beaten him in a street fight. He’s bloodied with Sir Keir now emboldened.
“This was the one result we really needed,” said one senior Labour figure. “It’s been our top focus for the past week and symbolically a very important win.”
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Analysis of local election and mayoral results
And Labour needed the boost, because, as Professor Michael Thrasher pointed out in his Sky News’ national vote share projection calculated from the local election results, Sir Keir was not picking up the sort of vote share that Tony Blair was winning in the run-up to the 1997 Labour landslide.
His latest calculation of a 35% vote share for Labour and 26% for the Tories, put Sir Keir winning a general election but short of a majority.
What the West Midlands mayoral win did for Sir Keir was to give him a clear narrative that he is coming for the Tories and will do what he needs to take them down.
It raises inevitable questions about what is next for Rishi Sunak. The prime minister had nowhere to go today, not one win to celebrate. The worst performance in council elections in 40 years, was already pretty much as bad as it gets before the loss of Andy Street. The former Conservative mayor was magnanimous towards the prime minister, saying the loss was his alone.
But colleagues will not be so generous. One former cabinet minister said this loss was “devastating”. “We’re done and there’s no appetite to move against him,” said the senior MP. Many Tories tell me they are now resigned to defeat and believe Mr Sunak and his team needed to own it, rather than the rest of the party.
The coming days might be bumpy, the mood will be stony. But Tories tell me not much will actually change for them.
For Sir Keir, he now needs to sell not the changed Labour Party, but his vision for changing the country. The West Mids mayor’s win was dazzling, but it could have so easily gone the other way. And as Mr Sunak fights to survive, Labour still has to fight hard to win.