News Coverage
Semafor: Warren probes CEOs over their tax break lobbying
The top Democrat on the Senate Banking Committee, Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, is asking the CEOs of Amazon, Apple, Alphabet, Meta, and Tesla how they swayed Republicans to pursue bringing back a provision allowing businesses to deduct research and development costs from their taxes right away, instead of spreading them out over multiple years. The move, which is being weighed as part of the GOP's tax package, could retroactively be worth a collective $75 billion for the last three … Continue Reading
March 06, 2025
Wall Street Journal: Senators Call for DOJ Probe of X’s Advertiser Pressure Campaign
Five Democratic senators have asked the Justice Department to investigate whether Elon Musk is leveraging his influence in the Trump administration to bully advertisers into returning to X. The request, from Sens. Elizabeth Warren, Cory Booker, Richard Blumenthal, Adam Schiff and Chris Van Hollen, follows a Wall Street Journal report last month about the social-media platform’s pressuring Interpublic Group to spend more on X. If Musk uses his government position to harm those who don’t … Continue Reading
March 05, 2025
The Verge: Senate votes to strip the CFPB of its power to regulate X
The Senate voted on Wednesday to strip a key financial regulator of its ability to monitor digital platforms like X, as the social media company’s owner, Elon Musk, has become the public face of the government office seeking to shrink the agency’s workforce. The resolution, which still requires House approval, would effectively moot a rule finalized by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) last year establishing its authority to monitor digital payment offerings, just as it already … Continue Reading
February 27, 2025
Reuters: Exclusive: Senators ask Trump's Air Force nominee to respond to allegations of favoring Musk's SpaceX
Two members of the Senate Armed Services Committee on Thursday asked President Donald Trump's Air Force secretary nominee whether he unfairly favored Elon Musk in a classified, multibillion-dollar spy satellite contract. In a letter sent Thursday, Senators Elizabeth Warren and Tammy Duckworth, both Democrats, asked nominee Troy Meink how his role in the contract solicitation may have favored SpaceX, Musk's rocket and satellite company. The Massachusetts and Illinois lawmakers cited a recent … Continue Reading
February 27, 2025
HuffPost: Elizabeth Warren Presses X To Find 25,000 Tweets Deleted By Trump Nominee
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) wants to know what happened to 25,000 tweets that a key Donald Trump nominee deleted soon after the 2024 election, and she on Wednesday wrote a letter to X CEO Linda Yaccarino requesting those records. Bill Pulte, an investor whose grandfather founded PulteGroup and made it a housing construction empire, is President Trump’s nominee to serve as director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, which regulates trillions of dollars in the housing finance … Continue Reading
February 27, 2025
HuffPost: Democrats Alarmed By DOGE’s Access To ‘Sensitive Databases’
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and other lawmakers pressed the Education Department on Wednesday to clarify how much access Elon Musk’s team had been granted to student loan borrowers’ sensitive data and what they planned to do with it. In a letter to acting Education Secretary Denise Carter, Democrats said the agency had provided “woefully inadequate” information about who was using the data and to what end. They said the Education Department’s written response to their questions earlier … Continue Reading
February 27, 2025
AP: DOGE access to US intelligence secrets poses a national security threat, Democrats say
Democratic lawmakers are demanding answers from Elon Musk about whether staffers at his Department of Government Efficiency have shared national security secrets over insecure communication channels. Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Rep. Gerry Connolly of Virginia were joined by several other Democrats on a letter Thursday that asserts that reckless actions by Musk and Republican President Donald Trump's cost-cutting initiative present a threat to national security by exposing … Continue Reading
February 26, 2025
Reuters: Democratic senator urges Trump Commerce nominee to take hard line on China
A senior Democratic senator on Wednesday urged President Donald Trump's nominee to lead the Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security to take a tough line on China, citing Chinese startup DeepSeek's artificial intelligence technology. U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, the top Democrat on the Banking Committee, told nominee Jeffrey Kessler in a letter seen by Reuters that the Trump administration should strengthen AI chips rules adopted by then-President Joe Biden's … Continue Reading
February 26, 2025
NOTUS: Top Democrats Want To Know More About Scott Turner’s Interest in Privatizing Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac
Senate Democrats are trying to get Housing Secretary Scott Turner to explain his support for reprivatizing Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac — and how such a change would impact homebuyers. In a letter obtained by NOTUS, ranking member of the Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee Elizabeth Warren and Minority Leader Chuck Schumer asked Turner to clarify what role the Department of Housing and Urban Development would play in the process — the Federal Housing Finance Agency is the … Continue Reading
February 25, 2025
USA TODAY: Thousands of consumer complaints unanswered after Trump CFPB purge, Dems say
Thousands of complaints submitted by Americans to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau alleging fraud or scams from private companies are going unanswered following President Donald Trump's efforts to dismantle the agency, Senate Democrats argue in a new report. Their conclusion is based on publicly available data detailed in an analysis released Tuesday by Democrats on the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs led by ranking member Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass. The … Continue Reading
February 25, 2025
Punchbowl News: The Vault: Warren preps grilling for Trump CFPB nom
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) will ask the Trump administration nominee to lead the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau whether he’d refuse “any unlawful directives” from the White House and if the agency could operate with only 100 employees, according to a letter reviewed by Punchbowl News. Jonathan McKernan appears before the Senate Banking Committee on Thursday as the White House’s pick to lead the CFPB full-time. With much of the agency’s operations still suspended, we expect McKernan … Continue Reading
February 24, 2025
Politico Pro: Warren questions Pulte on future of Fannie, Freddie
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) has questions for Federal Housing Finance Agency Director nominee Bill Pulte. Warren, the top Democrat on the Senate Banking Committee, on Monday sent Pulte a 23-page letter with 62 multi-part questions for him to review “and be prepared to answer” at his confirmation hearing before the panel on Thursday. Pulte has been nominated to run the agency that regulates Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the government-controlled mortgage giants standing behind roughly half … Continue Reading
February 24, 2025
Forbes: Senator Warren Is Investigating Trump-Musk Attacks On American Consumers
Senator Elizabeth Warren, the Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affair Committee's top Democrat is convening a forum today to investigate the President Donald Trump-Elon Musk attack on the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. It is thanks to Senator Warren that this important financial regulator even exists. She was instrumental in having the CFPB created as part of the Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010. Since then, this independent agency has returned over $21 billion … Continue Reading
February 24, 2025
New York Times: Warren raises concerns about DOGE’s ability to access sensitive commerce data.
Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts sent a letter to Howard Lutnick, the commerce secretary, expressing concern that members of Elon Musk's so-called Department of Government Efficiency could gain access to a trove of sensitive data held by the Commerce Department. "The department is perhaps the largest repository of trade secrets and other forms of sensitive and confidential data on Mr. Musk's competitors and business partners," Ms. Warren wrote in the letter, which was published on … Continue Reading
February 24, 2025
Financial Times: Democrats demand Donald Trump nominee commit to Fed’s independence
Democrats are demanding that Donald Trump’s nominee to be a top US economic adviser commit to the independence of the Federal Reserve, as Congress scrutinises the president’s efforts to gain more control over the central bank. Elizabeth Warren, the top Democrat on the Senate banking committee, has sent a letter to the White House asking Stephen Miran, Trump’s nominee to chair the Council of Economic Advisers (CEA), whether he would “commit to supporting the Fed’s independence from political … Continue Reading
February 24, 2025
HuffPost: Trump's Education Secretary Pick 'Wholeheartedly Supports' His Plan To Dissolve It
Linda McMahon, President Donald Trump’s pick to run the Department of Education, appears to be fully on board with destroying the agency she’s set to run. In a series of questions asked by Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Andy Kim (D-N.J.) after McMahon’s confirmation hearing before the Senate education panel earlier this month, the nominee said she “wholeheartedly supports” Trump’s plan to abolish the department. “President Trump believes that the bureaucracy in Washington should be … Continue Reading
February 20, 2025
CNBC: Sen. Elizabeth Warren: DOGE’s FDIC firings put banking system at risk
In response to a request from Sen. Elizabeth Warren, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. will review President Donald Trump’s recent move to lay off more workers at the watchdog agency. Backed by the Trump administration, Elon Musk and his advisory group, the Department of Government Efficiency, reduced the FDIC staff by around 1,000 employees so far this year through buyout offers and the layoffs of probationary employees, according to reports. The additional firings were part of a larger … Continue Reading
February 20, 2025
Variety: Disney-Fubo Deal Raises Antitrust Concerns, Senator Says
Sen. Elizabeth Warren has urged the Justice Department to carefully scrutinize Disney‘s deal to acquire a controlling stake in Fubo, saying the consolidation presents antitrust concerns. Disney announced in January that it would merge its Hulu + Live TV service with Fubo and take 70% ownership of the combined company. A few days later, Disney, Fox and Warner Bros. Discovery dropped their plans to launch Venu Sports, a combined streaming service. In a letter to the DOJ’s Antitrust Division, … Continue Reading
February 20, 2025
Punchbowl News: Can Senate Republicans pull off permanent tax cuts?
President Donald Trump dealt Senate Republicans a blow Wednesday in the seemingly never-ending struggle over how to move his agenda on Capitol Hill. Trump sided with the House GOP’s reconciliation roadmap right as the Senate began floor consideration of its own plan. However Congress decides to package top GOP priorities — one bill, two bills — Senate Republicans are gearing up for an arguably more consequential fight on the substance of the legislation. Senate GOP leaders have drawn a red … Continue Reading
February 19, 2025
Bloomberg: DOGE Staffers at CFPB Raise Ethics Concerns, Warren Says
A pair of Senate Democrats demanded Department of Government Efficiency staffers associated with Elon Musk vacate the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, saying their presence undermines an agency responsible for regulating the billionaire's yet-to-be-released payments venture. Senators Elizabeth Warren and Adam Schiff said Musk is "not only neutralizing the pro-consumer agency that will supervise X's digital wallet - he is also potentially gaining access to confidential corporate data that … Continue Reading