Johnson Discusses Bankruptcy Reform with Home State Senator

WASHINGTON-NCUA Vice Chair JoAnn Johnson recently met with Senator Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) to discuss the prospects for bankruptcy reform before jetting off to Iowa to spend Easter with her family. “I always welcome the opportunity to see my Senator,” Johnson remarked. The bankruptcy reform legislation (H.R. 975), which Grassley has sponsored in the Senate, was a main topic of discussion, she said. Her Senator explained to her that it would likely be the House version of the bill that would move through the Senate, if it does. The House version did not include the controversial abortion clinic language-the so-called Schumer amendment-and does include language providing parity to NCUA with FDIC involving qualified financial contracts in liquidations. Currently the two agencies are treated equally but somehow this language was inadvertently overlooked in the Senate version. Johnson advocated that if the Senate version did move that the language be added. One of Grassley’s staffers told Johnson that she had heard more of a buzz about the bill lately, which may indicate interest in moving it forward. Johnson and Grassley also talked about Iowa and she briefly took the opportunity to raise the credit union taxation issue.