Elizabeth Warren and Elijah Cummings are pressing the Federal Reserve to answer questions about a leak from a 2012 monetary policy meeting that has yet to be explained.
The Massachusetts senator and Maryland congressman sent a letter to the Fed on Thursday asking for information from an internal Fed investigation into the source of the leak.
The two liberals said that they were “disturbed” about the lack of transparency surrounding the investigation, and that the leak could have violated federal law.
“We believe that the public has the right to know whether the Federal Reserve is taking appropriate action to address leaks of confidential and deliberative information and to prevent them from occurring in the future,” they wrote. “Congress also needs this information to ensure accountability at the Federal Reserve and to determine whether legislative proposals are necessary in order to address this problem.”
The Fed’s monetary policy committee meetings are kept confidential because their decisions relating to interest rates and the money supply routinely cause significant movements in world markets.
ProPublica reported in December that Medley Global Advisors, a policy intelligence firm that serves hedge funds and other investors, sent out a letter to its clients containing information about a 2012 Fed monetary policy meeting before that information was due to be released to the public. The meeting took place as the Fed was considering a third round of large-scale bond purchases.
The Fed subsequently launched an internal investigation into the source of the leak, but the results of that probe have not been disclosed.
In their letter addressed to Federal Reserve Board of Governors general counsel Scott Alvarez, Warren and Cummings request a briefing from Fed officials by Feb. 15, as well as for information about the findings of the investigation.
The lawmakers’ questions about a leak at a Fed monetary policy meeting come as congressional Republicans are rallying behind legislation that would subject those meetings to an audit from the Government Accountability Office.
Fed chairwoman Janet Yellen and other central bank officials oppose that audit, warning that it would introduce political pressures into decisions about monetary policy.
