Housing Opportunity Mortgage Expansion Act

Floor Speech

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Ms. DUCKWORTH. Mr. President, thank you. I thank the chairman and my colleagues from Wisconsin for their support of this bipartisan legislation, which I introduced in January and filed as an amendment to S. 2155. As the chairman stated, as a result of the 2016 regulation, many of the FHLB system's captive insurance members have had or will soon have their membership terminated. Our legislation seeks to ensure that captive insurer affiliates of institutions that are active providers of private capital in the mortgage market are eligible to restore or continue their membership.

Their membership is crucial to reliable access to low-cost funding for home mortgages and affordable housing initiatives in Illinois. For the Federal Home Loan Bank of Chicago, these members serve as an important source of private capital in the mortgage market. Their membership broadens access to credit to financial institutions that would otherwise not be able to access credit through their local markets and creates a reliable source of liquidity for affordable housing initiatives.

Our bipartisan bill only seeks to redress those captives that were previously granted FHLB membership prior to February 19, 2016. By allowing captive insurers to continue to invest in mortgages and mortgage-related securities through the FHLB system, they can continue to provide both credit and liquidity to the market. Such sources of private capital are critical to the long-term financing of the FHLB system, and therefore, eligibility in the system should be preserved. Our legislation will achieve this purpose. I wish to turn to my friend from Wisconsin, Senator Johnson.

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