President-elect Joe Biden will nominate Gary Gensler to lead the Securities and Exchange Commission and Rohit Chopra to head the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, according to a statement from Biden’s transition team Monday morning.
The pair’s selection marks a triumph for progressives who have pushed for more aggressive oversight of the financial industry.
Gensler is a top financial regulator known for taking on big banks and trading houses after the Dodd-Frank financial reforms enacted after the 2008 financial crisis.
A former Goldman Sachs executive, Gensler has an extensive career in government, serving as under secretary of the treasury for domestic finance from 1999 to 2001 and assistant secretary of the treasury for financial markets from 1997 to 1999. He went on to serve in the Obama administration as the chairman of the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission and was the CFO for Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign.
Chopra, an ally of Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., helped her launch the CFPB prior to her run for U.S. Senate. He went on to become the assistant director of the CFPB, where he led the agency’s effort on student loans. He now serves as a commissioner on the Federal Trade Commission.
“[Chopra] has actively advocated to promote fair, competitive markets that protect families and honest businesses from abuses,” the announcement read. “Commissioner Chopra was unanimously confirmed by the Senate in 2018, and he has pushed for aggressive remedies against lawbreaking companies, especially repeat offenders.”
Both Gensler and Chopra will have to be confirmed by the Senate.
