senator crapo mentioned some of those. as members of the committee know, hud faces a number of challenges. last year for the first time the federal housing administration received a 1.7 trillion -- excuse me. billion dollar infusion of taxpayer cash to cover a shortfall in its insurance fund brought about by many of the loans they had backed that went south. hud also continues to struggle with its performance and oversight challenges as identified by the inspector general. and as we've seen with the recent scandal at the veterans administration, the american people need leaders who will hold folks accountable and restore transparency to government. and while the issue doesn't fall squarely within hud's jury dicti -- jurisdiction, i also look forward to hearing about the mayor's views on the future role of freddie and fannie which i believe senator crapo alludedsu. after meeting with mayor castro -- leading texatexas's sd largest city. i want to thank you and the members of the committee for the opportunity to introduce the

chairman and ranking member crapo. it's my pleasure to be with you here today to introduce a fellow san antonioian and texan mr. castro. he has told me that he's glad to be here and looked forward to your question buzz he especially looks forward to being back in san antonio to help celebrate the victory of the san antonio spurs which that celebration is still going on and will for a long time. i know he will take the opportunity to introduce his wife erica and i understand his brother joaquin castro. a member of the united states's congress in route. i hope he will have an opportunity to do that. but my comments are that mayor castro has taken quite a road to get to where he is today one that's uniquely texan. i would say uniquely american. i know you will here more about his biography which is compelling but i will point out that mr. castro and his brother were raised by a single mom in san antonio's west side. both graduated from thomas jefferson high school then. he went to stanford and to harvard law school. quite

thank you very much for the question, ranking member crapo. and i want to commend you and the committee for, as you said, very strong bipartisan work on the fha solvency act. i am committed to helping to ensure that if i am confirmed, that the fha is on a good track and to support legislative efforts to that effect. it's my understanding that in the independent actuary has said, at least for fiscal year 2015, the fha is on a stronger track. that it will not need another draw. but i -- if i am confirmed at hud, i look forward to working with you and to the committee to support legislative efforts as well. >> thank you very much. and that is good news to hear. will you assure us that the fha will not do anything to reduce its incoming capital before it has met its statutory obligations? >> thank you for the question. of course, i'm hesitant to commit to things specifically, not having been at hud and seen all of the details. however, i will say that i share with you a commitment to ensuring that the fha has a positive capital reserve ratio, that

chairman. >> thank you, senator crapo. any other members who would like to give brief opening statements? senator menendez? >> emergency alert. >> yeah. >> senator menendez. >> thank you, mr. chairman. welcome director cordray. the cfpb earlier this year released a report on consumer protection issues involving student loans and as i look at hard working middle class new jerseyans trying to get ahead, i feel that they fall further behind. a new class of college graduates preparing to enter the work force, but the question is at what cost to them and their families? at what cost if something should happen to them before the loan is paid off? the experience of the family of christopher briskie in my state of new jersey illustrates how challenging the issues with stateme these can be. during this time of hardship, christopher's parents were shocked to learn that his student loan debt continued, that not the injury nor christopher's death was enough to stop the debt from growing. while some private lenders made clear they will

have kept this vigil, and we appreciate the men and who made this release possible, but yesterday, crapo said this, could potentially result in a problem for the national security. and where is all of this headed no the days ahead, alex? congressional hearings here? >> yes. next tuesday, the senate is going to be having a hearing on the circumstances surrounding bergdahl's release. one of the big questions is, is this hearing public or private? carl levin, the democratic chairman wants to keep it behind closed doors, but the republicans want it opened up to the public and they have a unlikely ally in senate majority leader harry reid who wants them public, and the white house is going to go ahead to hearings, so there is attention going to be paid between the house and the senate in a coming days. >> and bobby, in the magazine's explorations, is there any idea why it is bergdahl that they traded for? >> well, a number of theories, but hard to be definitive, but as you said earlier in the report with aymon, and he is responding to the treatment, and we will hear from him, and so i hope th

another look such as was proposed by senators wyden and crapo in the bill they introduced that suggests perhaps the forest service and the federal agencies continue to provide in their budget the initial attack and the forces and the the costs of that initial attack. and we do catch 98% of our fires during that period. but it's those 2% that get away that cost us about 30% of that suppression budget, and those are fires that perhaps fall into a disaster category and ought to be treated, financed differently. if that were to happen, then we would hope that the agency could headache proposals -- could make proposals for using some of that budget constraint to increase the land treatment and reduce the risk further. and that would be our approach, and we would hope that something like that could at least be considered. thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you very much. let me ask, i'll ask questions at the end, but let me ask william dougan, national president of the national federation of federal employees next, please. >> thank you, mr. chairman and members of the subcommittee, for invitin

. >> senator crapo? >> thank you mr. chairman and director cordray. i want to start out with regard to the big data collection issue, director cordray. there are so many questions to ask on that, i'm just going to get into this briefly. i want to remind you, we need to get further answers from the agency with regard to literally the scope of and the content of the big data project that's underway to collect credit card information. i just want to clarify one fact in these questions. that is it's my understanding that the agency's goal is to collect the credit card transaction information on 90% of the credit card accounts in the united states. is that correct? >> i believe that's correct. although i wouldn't put it that way. we're not trying to collect information on individual credit card accounts. we're trying to collect information that will give us the pattern of credit card activity in the marketplace so that we can protect consumers against the kind of abuses that led to the card act. and have been reined in under the card act. we're also trying

private information about millions of consumers at risk representative jeb hensarling and senator mike crapo believe that this expansion represents an unwarranted intrusion about the private lives of ordinary americans is the ranking republican on the senate banking housing and urban finance committee will answer lena is chairman of the house financial services committee according to the washington examiner the database is expansion means it will include a host of data points such as a mortgage owner's name address social security number all credit card and loan information and account balances now the database will also include the mortgage holders entire credit history including delinquent payments late payments minimum payments high account balances and credit scores oh and it will all. so a simple household demographic data which will include things like racial ethnic data gender marital status religion education employment history military status household composition number of wage earners and a family's total wealth and assets wow now if this is a little intrusive that's because it is

private information about millions of consumers at risk representative jeb hensarling and senator mike crapo believe that this expansion represents an unwarranted intrusion about the private lives of ordinary americans is the ranking republican on the senate banking housing and urban finance committee will answer lena is chairman of the house.

this is the response from idaho senator mike crapo when he heard the news. >> today is a day of celebrationll of us. it's been just about five years since bowe has been in custody of the taliban. today he's in the custody of the united states. we'll protect him and get him home. sentiments shared in idaho. they had huge ribbons on the cole oms of the state capital. lots of folks have not forgotten the young man. he may have dropped off the radar, but not the case in hayley, idaho. he'll go germany for rest, medical check-up, debriefing, and be brought to the united states to a military medical facility in san antonio, texas. at some point we assume he'll come back to idaho and back to haley, and the coffee shop that you see, which has been the center of efforts to keep him in the public eye. this is the prop pritorrest, sue martins, the opener, named the spokesperson for bowe bergdahl, and kept the torch turning for five years. what was the feeling for you when you heard that bowe bergdahl was free. tremendous relief and happy innocence for his fam -- happiness for his family and everywhere

i share senator crapo's concern about the amount of data being collected. i understand the need to have enough to do the analysis, but we need to be very mindful, of the sensitivity of consumers today, about their information. there is a growing insecurity and if they look at federal government -- we had not exactly given them reason to believe that we will be confidential with it, or that we will be straightforward. i look forward to the report, i look forward to other enhanced discussions and i want to mention something on payday lending. i was probably one of the first foolish people to way into that area, back in the day and i will tell you a quick little story. the payday lending that was going on, was just as egregious as it is today, it has just taken different forms. but why i was unsuccessful in getting appropriate regulations is that 900 consumers signed a petition telling me to mind my own business. and so we need to be aware that in that lane, there is a desperate need, that is not being fulfilled for short-term credit, whether this is to buy ca

i asked chuck schumer and mike crapo to deal with issues. they were asked to work together on that particular issue. it is just too large a question for the committee itself to deal with. while their names are not on it and while they don't necessarily have voted for it, they are major factors that contributed to what is in this bill. that was terribly disappointing to me because had there been more participation on some of these issues, the bill will look different today. i think we wrote a good bill. i regret we didn't have strong provisions on ratings. i would've loved to have this deal with fannie and freddie. a lot more could have been dealt with. i'm grateful for bob corker and mark warner. they couldn't do so because of two issues and this is what -- there were two issues that drove people away. the creation of the consumer protection bureau and corporate governance issues. it wasn't the volcker rule. it had to do with the creation of a consumer protection bureau and what they perceived to be too tough on corporate governance issues.

one of the things having just been in canada this week in the senator blunting crapo and senator sessionss well as senator stabenow we as part of the inter-parliamentarian group identified structure issues on the border and in the past two years u. s. customs and border have received authorization from congress to initiate programs to enter into public right of partnerships and except private donations to help improve the efficiency of border crossings. i'm concerned that these border crossings are right now the rights have been given solely on the southern border and for instance a lan port of entry in international falls minnesota was built in 1993 and has been deemed in need of replacement by the cbp the customs border protection in and the general services administration. we are really interested in this public-private partnership. obviously with the energy and the oil and everything else coming from canada as well as the trade and agricultural. going on we think this is a smart investment in america's economy. can you talk to me about why programs are only in place on the southern bo

. >> senator crapo. >> thank you. before i go back to data, operation choke point, news release tells us that the department of justice and several regulating bankers are pressuring to end regularationships with gun stores or retailers. and this is known as operation choke point. are you familiar with it? >> i have certainly read numerous press accounts of it and tl therefore i would say -- and therefore i would say i'm aware of it. >> is the cfpv doing anything about it. >> i think it should be police of legal lending, whether online or in person. and much of what we are talking about here is online. the further issue that has been raised is what about illegal lending that operates by piggy backing on the existing payment system. that is not something the banks like, not a risk they want to be exposed to. some of this gets into areas of credential regulation, safety and soundness and risk and operational risk, legal risk and things i am not an expert on -- >> does this mean you are participating with operation choke

private information about millions of consumers at risk representative jeb hensarling and senator mike crapobelieve that this expansion represents an unwarranted intrusion about the private lives of ordinary americans is the ranking republican on the senate banking housing and urban finance committee while answer lena is chairman of the house financial services committee according to the washington examiner the database is expansion means it will include a host of data points such as a mortgage owner's name address social security number all credit card and loan information and account balances now the database will also include the mortgage holders entire credit history including delinquent payments late payments minimum payments high account balances and credit scores oh and it will also resemble household demographic data which will include things like racial ethnic data gender marital status religion education employment history military status household composition number of wage earners and a family's total wealth. and assets wow now if this seems a little intrusive that's because it i

ranking member crapo, members of the committee, thank you very much for the opportunity to appear before you today. i am honored to be president obama's nominee for inspector general of the federal housing finance agency. before i begin, i'd like to introduce my family who has accompanied me here today. my husband andy, our daughter, kate, my stead fast mother, my inlaws walter and ann pinkas. with that, let me get to the meat of what i'd like to say in my statement. the fhfa plays a crucial role in our financial system. as the safety and soundness regulator of fannie mae, fannie mac, and the 12 regional federal home loan banks. to ensure they operate in a safe and sound measure and serve as a reliable source of liquidity and funding for housing finance. as senator crapo mentioned, since 2008, almost six years now, the agency has acted as conservator for fannie mae and fannie mac to protect the assets and properties of those enterprises and protect the tax payers investment which is currently $187.5 billion. currently fannie mae and fannie mac guarantee more than $5 trillion in mortgages