Federal Reserve Racial and Economic Equity Act

Floor Speech

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Mrs. BEATTY. Mr. Speaker, let me first thank Chairman Green for yielding and for his outstanding job of managing the floor today.

I also thank Chairwoman Maxine Waters for her leadership in bringing diversity and inclusion to the forefront of the conversation in the financial services industry. It was her vision to create the Financial Services Committee's Subcommittee on Diversity and Inclusion, and I have had the honor to serve as its chair since its inception.

The racial justice equity package before us today is very much the product of the subcommittee's work over the past 3-plus years, and I am proud to say that many of its provisions were authored by subcommittee members. Republicans participated in the hearing, and today, when we deflect to issues like what we are hearing, it is very alarming. There is nothing controversial in this package or the bills I am going to reference.

Two of my bills are included in this package, the Diversity and Inclusion Data Accountability and Transparency Act, referred to as the D&I DATA Act, that will direct the Office of Minority and Women Inclusion to collect data on the financial institutions they oversee. This will allow us to measure the progress that banks and other financial institutions are making on diversity performance.

My second bill is the Expanding Opportunity for Minority Depository Institutions Act that will codify a program at Treasury that pairs mentor businesses with protege MDIs, giving the smaller lenders access to things like technical assistance and contracting opportunities.

I am so pleased; in my Third Congressional District of Ohio a new MDI has been approved.

I also note that my bill, the Ensuring Diverse Leadership Act, has been made in order as an amendment and will be considered later. That amendment will require the Fed to consider candidates of diverse ethnicity and gender when filling vacancies in the Federal Reserve Bank.

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