Transparent Insurance Standards Act of 2016

Floor Speech

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Mr. CLEAVER. I thank the ranking member for allowing me to speak on this legislation.

Mr. Speaker, I find much greater satisfaction in working on legislation with the subcommittee chairman, Blaine Luetkemeyer, than opposing such; but, Mr. Speaker, I do, in fact, believe that H.R. 5143 would prescribe narrowly tailored reporting and negotiating requirements that must be completed before any international regulatory insurance standard could be agreed on.

In the wake of the financial crisis with the passage of Dodd-Frank, the Federal Insurance Office, FIO, was
tasked with representing the United States at international insurance forums. Currently, the FIO has been negotiating alongside the Federal Reserve and the National Association of Insurance Commissioners, NAIC, on behalf of our country's insurance interests. The Housing and Insurance Subcommittee has held numerous hearings on this topic, giving us ample opportunity to more fully understand the process that is being undertaken at the International Association of Insurance Supervisors as well as with other international bodies.

It is critical that Team USA continue to advocate strongly on behalf of the U.S. insurance system, and it is
imperative that we do not hamstring their ability to do so. More specifically, the bill contains a number of provisions that would ultimately delay our negotiations abroad. If we limit the ability of our negotiators to do their job, we lose our seat at the international table, which, I believe, will weaken our position. Like most on the other side, I am a strong proponent of the State-based system.

Our Missouri insurance commissioner has recently held a national position. In order to effectively communicate our position and advocate for this unique American system, we need to ensure that our international representatives are empowered, and we believe that this actually impacts their role at the table.

Additionally, none of the standards that may be decided upon internationally are binding. This is, perhaps, the most significant thing I am saying. As everyone knows, the States would have to approve any standards because we can't impose those standards on them. These standards would have to be agreed to domestically--they would have to go to each and every State--and they won't be approved on the Federal level. This process would include a notice and a comment period.

I do believe that this bill does not address a single problem, that it does not fix any broken part of this process
that is going on.

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