The Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs will come to order.

Welcome to our three nominees and their family.

Last week, the Senate Banking Committee was essentially conducting high-profile job interviews.

The job?

Helping lead the Federal Reserve on the Fed's Board of Governors.

President Biden has three seats to fill on the board, and his nominations need Senate approval.

Last week's hearing was a chance for senators to meet and question Biden's picks.

But as ranking Republican, Senator Pat Toomey noted, the hearing was about much more

than filling job openings.

It's really a referendum on the Fed's independence and whether or not we're going to abandon

a core part of our own democracy.

These nominees have sparked a fierce debate over the Fed's role and how involved it should

be in addressing societal issues.

Republicans particularly believe that the Fed really has sort of a narrow mandate of stable

prices and maximum employment, and they take a very wary view of sort of any movement

by the Fed into what they would call social issues, like climate change, like discrimination.

They feel if we want to address those sorts of issues, it's on Congress, not the Fed.

So they don't want the Fed to sort of go too far into regulating around climate change

or setting policy with an eye towards the effects on economic inequality.

But I guess what other people are arguing is that thinking about these issues is part

of the Fed's mission.

This divide was on display last week.

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