Former Representative Scott Garrett Heading for the Securities and Exchange Commission

February 11,2018
the staff of the Ridgewood blog

Ridgewood NJ, Former Representative Scott Garrett, the New Jersey Republican whose bid to become chairman of the Export-Import Bank failed last year after the Senate Banking Committee rejected his nomination, to lead the agency that Garrett had criticized for corrupt practices and cronyism.

The former Representative has been tapped to work as a senior adviser to Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Jay Clayton, according to unnamed sources at the SEC. While he was a lawmaker, Garrett was also a critic of the SEC after it dropped the ball in 2008 and served as chairman of the House Financial Services subcommittee on capital markets.

Former U.S. Rep. Scott Garrett Tapped to lead U.S. Export-Import Bank

April 15,2017
the staff of the Ridgewood blog

President Donald Trump said Friday he would nominate former U.S. Rep. Scott Garrett, who had supported closing the U.S. Export-Import Bank, to head the credit agency. Garrett's fight against the agency was well documented on this blog.

Mr. Garrett voted in both 2012 and in 2015 against renewing the charter of the Ex-Im Bank, which guarantees loans for companies that export U.S. products.

Garrett had worked closely with Rep. Jeb Hensarling (R., Texas), the current chair of the House Financial Services Committee who steered the campaign to curtail the Ex-Im Bank. He helped engineer a five-month lapse in the agency’s charter in 2015, and the Ex-Im Bank hasn’t been able to approve financial for deals of more than $10 million for the last two years because Senate Republicans didn’t fill empty board seats, depriving the agency of a quorum.

Garrett’s nomination comes just days after Trump appeared to soften his stance on the bank and said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal he now supported the bank after having been critical of it.