Today, U.S. Senator John Barrasso (R-WY) and U.S. Representative Bill Posey (R-FL) re-introduced the Maintaining Agency Direction on Financial Fraud Act. The Act blocks the Security and Exchange Commission's (SEC) requirement that companies disclose the impacts of climate change on their businesses.
"In this economy, the SEC's main responsibility should be to protect American investors and maintain fair markets," said Barrasso. "Instead, it's actually wasting time and resources on regulating climate change. This is yet another startling example of how the Administration is making it worse for job creators across our country. Our bill blocks the SEC from forcing American employers to conduct burdensome and expensive climate analysis."
"I think the SEC has its priorities wrong," said Posey. "We know the SEC was given all of the evidence on Bernard Madoff's $65 Billion Ponzi scheme in 1999 and they failed to act. Many institutional investors spurned Madoff in the early 1990's due to discrepancies. Why didn't the SEC catch on to his scheme? Instead of enforcing climate change policies, the SEC might want to focus its attention on protecting investors from fraud and abuse in the financial markets. With so much capital investment at stake every day, we can't afford another Madoff scandal because the SEC was distracted by other issues such as climate change."