The struggle to add two commissioners to the SEC drags on, leaving SEC Chair Mary Jo White and two other SEC commissioners (Michael Piwowar and Kara Stein) to do the work of what is supposed to be a five-member commission. The most recent development in this saga came yesterday, when it was believed that nominees Lisa Fairfax and Hester Peirce would finally be approved. Nope! The WSJ reports that after a confusing voice vote, four Democrats on the Senate Banking Committee indicated that they opposed the nominees, leading Committee Chairman Richard Shelby to postpone the vote.
The surprisingly difficult task of adding two new SEC commissioners has moved forward in slow motion since mid-2015. In May 2015, SEC Commissioner Daniel Gallagher announced that he would would be departing the agency earlier than expected — “as soon as a successor is confirmed by the Senate.” Gallagher’s planned departure coincided with that of his fellow commissioner, Luis Aguilar, whose term was set to expire in June 2015. As I wrote back in May 2015, it was “unclear whether Aguilar will agree to stay on past June [2015] if his successor has not yet been confirmed by the Senate.”
