Frank backs Warren as agency leader

WASHINGTON, July 26 (UPI) -- Rep. Barney Frank said the best person to run the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is the person credited with the idea, Elizabeth Warren.

"It is essential to the bill and very important that Elizabeth Warren be appointed," said Frank, The Washington Post reported Monday.

Warren, a Harvard professor, outlined the idea of a financial product protection bureau in 2007 and found the idea resonated when she explained while the Consumer Product Safety Commission protects consumers from faulty goods, there is no equivalent agency protecting consumers from faulty loans that can devastate a family.

President Obama said Friday: "I have the highest regard for Elizabeth. We have not made decisions about who we're going to appoint yet."

But Frank, as the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, represents an influential endorsement.

Backing her candidacy are liberals who are concerned the 2,300-page financial reform bill that created the agency is watered down and see Warren, who chairs the panel assigned to monitor the $700 billion federal bank bailout program, as tough on behalf of consumers.

Others fear her candidacy for the same reason.

"A lot of us are terrified about what happens in rule-making," said Stephen Lerner at the Service Employees International Union.

Other possible choices to head the agency include Michael Barr, assistant secretary at the U.S. Treasury and Eugene Kimmelman, a deputy assistant attorney general at the Department of Justice.