Senate Banking will take up Diamond nomination for a third time

Shelby has called Diamond an “old-fashioned” Keynesian supporter of big government.

Diamond, an authority on unemployment, Social Security, pensions and taxes, has advocated for the executive and legislative branches to put off worrying about long-term deficits and spend “vigorously” toward recovery, which could serve as a primary reason for Republicans, who’ve focused heavily of the deficit, to oppose his nomination. 

Other Republicans have opposed Diamond because he favors the Fed’s controversial $600 billion bond-buying program. 

The panel approved Diamond’s nomination twice last year — each time on party-line votes — but Republicans blocked his consideration by the full Senate.

Other nominations scheduled for consideration include David Cohen, under secretary for Terrorism and Financial Crimes at Treasury; Daniel Glaser to be assistant secretary for Terrorist Financing at Treasury; Timothy Massad to be assistant secretary for Financial Stability at Treasury; Wanda Felton to be first vice president of the Export-Import Bank of the United States; and Sean Robert Mulvaney to be a member of the board of directors for the Export-Import Bank of the United States. 

Following votes on the nominations, the panel will hold the fourth in a series of hearings on financial stability with several high-profile witnesses scheduled to testify. 

Besides Bernanke, Neal Wolin, deputy secretary at Treasury; Sheila Bair, chairwoman of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation; Mary Schapiro, chairwoman of the Securities and Exchange Commission; Gary Gensler, chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission; and John Walsh, acting Comptroller of the Currency, will discuss their progress on implementing new financial regulatory reform rules.