By Zach Carter | 21 March 2017
HUFFINGTON POST — A confirmation vote on President Donald Trump’s nominee to chair the Securities and Exchange Commission is quickly developing into a proxy vote signaling whether moderate Democrats will collaborate with the administration’s efforts to roll back the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial reform law.
Trump nominated attorney Jay Clayton for the top SEC post in January. A partner at the elite corporate law firm Sullivan & Cromwell, Clayton is one of the top lawyers on Wall Street. Goldman Sachs and other firms hired him during the financial crisis.
Multiple Trump appointees have close ties to Goldman Sachs. Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin, National Economic Council Director Gary Cohn, Chief White House Strategist Steve Bannon, Deputy Treasury Secretary nominee James Donovan and Trump adviser Dina Powell all built careers at the banking titan. But financial reform advocates see Clayton’s work on Goldman’s behalf as perhaps their best opportunity to highlight Trump’s failure to live up to his populist campaign promises.
“[Clayton is] not just a former Wall Street lawyer, he’s not just a former Goldman Sachs attorney ― he was Goldman’s bailout lawyer. And now he wants to oversee all of Wall Street,” notes Kurt Walters, campaign director with the liberal advocacy group Demand Progress. […]
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