Former Obama car czar Steven Rattner has agreed to pay $6.2 million to settle federal charges over his role in a pay-to-play scandal, but said he won’t be “bullied” by New York’s attorney general into accepting a harsher penalty in a parallel state case.

The Securities and Exchange Commission announced Thursday that Rattner had accepted the fine and a two-year ban from the securities industry to resolve allegations that he paid illegal kickbacks to help his private equity firm land a lucrative investment from a state pension fund.