Sen. Elizabeth Warren is pressing Michael Faulkender for answers on a host of issues including his oversight of the pandemic-era Paycheck Protection Program, ahead of a Senate Finance hearing on his nomination to take the No. 2 spot at the Treasury Department.
Faulkender is due to appear before the Finance Committee on Thursday when the panel reviews his nomination to be deputy Treasury secretary. Committee Democrats objected to the scheduling of his hearing, citing a lack of cooperation from the Trump administration regarding the so-called Department of Government Efficiency’s access to sensitive financial and taxpayer data at Treasury and IRS.
Warren, D-Mass., also the top Democrat on the Senate Banking Committee, urged Faulkender to come prepared to answer questions about the pandemic-era program, which he oversaw as Treasury’s assistant secretary for economic policy during the first Trump administration.
“Your administration of PPP during Trump’s administration led to the ‘biggest fraud in a generation,’ the theft of over 10 percent of the $800 billion that Congress allocated to support small businesses,” Warren wrote in a 32-page letter shared with CQ Roll Call. She pressed Faulkender for answers about whether he would do anything differently given another chance.
Warren also took issue with the Trump administration’s handling of 2.7 million Paycheck Protection Program loans the Small Business Administration flagged for potential fraud. The administration removed those flags before former President Joe Biden was sworn in. Warren asked Faulkender whether he supported the Trump administration’s action.
FiscalNote, the parent company of CQ Roll Call, received a loan under the Paycheck Protection Program.
Since leaving the previous Trump administration, the nominee took roles as the chief economist of the Trump-aligned America First Policy Institute and as a finance professor at the University of Maryland’s business school.
‘Great Economic Boom’
Trump announced his intention to nominate Faulkender for the position in early December.
“Mike is a distinguished Economist and Policy practitioner who will drive our America First Agenda,” the president said in a post on his Truth Social site. “He will help Treasury Secretary Nominee Scott Bessent usher in a new Golden Age for the United States by delivering a Great Economic Boom for all Americans.”
Warren also pressed Faulkender for his stance on a host of other issues that fall under Treasury’s purview, including tax policy, bank regulations, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, tariffs, sanctions and more, as well as whether he backed DOGE’s access to Treasury’s sensitive payment systems.
On taxes, Warren sought answers from Faulkender on his stance on various possible offsets to the cost of extending the 2017 tax cuts. Faulkender, like many Republicans in Congress, supports making the expiring 2017 tax cuts permanent.
The Massachusetts Democrat asked Faulkender whether he would support cutting Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security benefits, rolling back clean energy tax credits or treating carried interest compensation for investment fund managers as ordinary income to lower a tax package’s cost. The White House has called for the latter, which has support among Democrats, to be included in Republicans’ planned tax package.
Warren also asked Faulkender about how the Congressional Budget Office should score Republicans’ extension of the Trump tax cuts, as well as whether he would commit to opposing the package if it’s found to increase the deficit.
She asked Faulkender to respond to each question in writing before the Finance Committee votes on his nomination.
While Warren’s questions may indicate a possible line of questions Democrats may take at Thursday’s hearing, it’s unlikely Faulkender will have much trouble getting confirmed.
Democrats haven’t been able to block more controversial Trump nominees, and Bessent ended up sailing through with 15 Democratic votes despite major questions on their side about the nominee’s taxes.
In 2019 during the first Trump administration, Finance approved Faulkender’s nomination on a 26-2 vote. Only Senate Finance ranking member Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and disgraced former Sen. Bob Menendez, D-N.J., voted against him in committee.
Panel Democrats who voted for Faulkender at the time who are still in the Senate include: Maria Cantwell of Washington, Michael Bennet of Colorado, Mark Warner of Virginia, Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire and Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada.
Faulkender may need to wait a while for official confirmation, however.
Finance voted to approve his 2019 nomination in February of that year, and the full Senate didn’t act until just before the August recess, when he was confirmed by voice vote. This year, there’s a big backlog of second-term Trump nominees the chamber needs to work through, and Democrats are in no hurry to help speed the process along.
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