GOP-led House panel votes to overhaul Dodd-Frank

WA S H I N GTO N — H o u s e Republicans took a major step toward their long-promised goal of unwinding the stricter financial rules created after the 2008 crisis, pushing forward sweeping legislation that would undo much of President Barack Obama’s landmark bank- ing law.

A House panel on Thursd a y a p p r o v e d Re p u b l i - c a n - w r i t t e n l e g i s l a t i o n that would gut much of the Dodd-Frank law enacted by Democrats and signed by Obama in an effort to prevent a recurrence of the Great Recession. The party-line vote in the Republican-led House Financial Services Committee was 34-26.

“I can’t do a good James Brown, but I feel good,” said Rep. Jeb Hensarling, the normally reserved Republican chairman of the committee, referring to the singer often called the godfather of soul. Hensarling wrote much of the overhaul legislation.

Republicans argued that the law passed under Presi d e n t B a r a c k O b a ma i s slowing economic growth because of the cost of compli- ance and by curbing lending.

Democrats warned the GOP bill will create the same conditions that led to the financial crisis and pushed the economy to the brink of collapse.

Rep. Maxine Waters, the panel’s senior Democrat, called it “a deeply misguided measure that would bring harm to consumers, investors and our whole economy.”