Providing for Congressional Disapproval of Rule Submitted By Office of the Comptroller of the Currency Relating to ``Community Reinvestment Act Regulations''
Floor Speech
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Mr. MEEKS. Madam Speaker, I rise in support of H.J. Res. 90, and I am proud to have joined Chairwoman Waters in introducing it.
This resolution provides for congressional disapproval of the rule submitted by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency relating to the Community Reinvestment Act.
The Community Reinvestment Act was enacted into law, as indicated, in 1977 as a direct response to the long, painful legacy of structural discrimination, financial exclusion, redlining, and economic suppression of racial minorities in America, a legacy of prejudice and economic exclusion that we are seeing all-too-clearly still echoes to this day, which is why many of the individuals you see in the streets today want to correct this structural problem that we have in our Nation.
At its core, the Community Reinvestment Act is a civil rights bill. It was the fourth in a series of banking bills passed to address systemic discrimination in banking, including the Fair Housing Act of 1968, the Equal Credit Opportunity Act of 1974, and the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act of 1975.
These bills built on the findings of the 1961 report from the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, and community-led civil action in Chicago to hold banks accountable for rampant discrimination in lending in Black and Hispanic communities.
Any efforts at reforms and modernization must remain true to this legacy, particularly given the overwhelming evidence of continued discrimination in banking and access to finance.
We must make sure that when we look at the CRA, the CRA is creating an opportunity for minority businesses to thrive and strive and investing further in its communities; that affordable housing is something that is there, not something where we are investing and driving people out so they can't have the benefits in the community. It must be relevant to the community and keeping the people in the community so that they can see a better life.
Under Comptroller Otting's leadership, the OCC's work on CRA modernization has systematically failed to remain true to the law's civil rights roots. In fact, the very way in which the rule was finalized and published by the OCC was symptomatic of the agency's failed approach from the start. It was rushed, unfinished, unsupported by data, and not done in coordination with the other prudential regulators.
And to cap it all off, Comptroller Otting abandoned his post within the very same week of publishing this rule, in the middle of a pandemic, economic crisis, and a looming banking crisis, leaving everyone else to hold the bag.
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Mr. MEEKS. Madam Speaker, the fact is, there is room to modernize CRA and to update it to the realities of modern-day banking. The Fed and community advocacy groups have put forward some thoughtful ideas on just how to do that.
Let us pass this bill, let us stop this ill-fated rule that the OCC put out, and let us do some real CRA to help people in these communities who have been deprived for far too long.
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