By David Morgan, Pete Schroeder and Lindsay Dunsmuir
(Reuters) -The head of the U.S. Senate Banking Committee on Tuesday delayed a vote on President Joe Biden’s five nominees to the Federal Reserve, including Chair Jerome Powell, after Republicans staged a boycott over objections to Sarah Bloom Raskin, the White House’s pick to be the central bank’s Wall Street regulator.
“Instead of showing up to work, to do their job, Republicans have walked out on the American people,” Committee Chair Sherrod Brown said to the other 11 Democratic senators on the 24-member panel who gathered for the vote. No Republicans were present.
Brown said he would try to reschedule a vote as soon as possible.
Before adjourning, the Democrats on the panel indicated unanimous support for the Fed nominees, with Senator Elizabeth Warren quickly correcting the record to show she stuck by her previously stated opposition to renominating Powell for another four-year term as chair.
Senator Pat Toomey, the top Republican on the committee, had called on fellow Republicans to skip the vote, citing what he said were unanswered questions about Raskin’s past role on the board of a fintech company.
Without the Republicans, the panel did not have a quorum, preventing it from voting on Biden’s slate and conducting other business.
The development delays confirmation of key members of the Fed’s leadership just as the U.S. central bank is gearing up to raise interest rates to combat the highest inflation in 40 years.
(Reporting by Pete Schroeder, Lindsay Dunsmuir and Ann Saphir; Editing by Michelle Price, Dan Burns and Paul Simao)