The House Republican in charge of an investigation into the collapse of Signature Bank was present in the bank’s Fifth Avenue boardroom ten days before it failed.
Patrick McHenry went there to ask bank directors for thousands of dollars.
According to a witness who attended the fundraiser on March 2 and requested anonymity to discuss the private matter, the atmosphere inside the Signature boardroom was peaceful. The source claimed that rather than overt worry or stress, there were concerns about the debt ceiling.
According to a spokeswoman, the McHenry campaign opted not to process any of the event donations last week.
Scott Shay, co-founder and chairman of Signature, sent an invitation to donors for the North Carolina Republican candidate’s event. The invitation said that attendance would cost $1,000, sponsorship would cost $2,900, and hosting responsibilities would cost $5,800. The funding went to Team McHenry, an organization that worked as a fundraising committee for the National Republican Congressional Committee, his congressional campaign, and his Innovation PAC.
The bipartisan hearing examining the failure of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature has been called the “first of numerous,” according to McHenry, chairman of the House Financial Services Committee.
Tim Scott, the leading Republican on the Banking Committee, ordered that the FDIC and Federal Reserve give information on their supervision of the two collapsed banks over the previous two years and keep all documents.
Since 2017, McHenry has been the preferred member of Congress by the bank. A little over $188,000 from Signature’s workers went to him, which is over three times the $66,000 they gave to Minnesota’s Tina Smith, a Democrat serving on the Senate Banking Committee, who received the second-highest amount from them.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer came in second among active members of Congress with $45,000. According to a Bloomberg review of Federal Election Commission data, all other Republican candidates received little more than $41,000 overall from Signature’s workers within the same time frame. From Signature workers, Democrats collected $284,000 overall or $53,000 more than Republicans.
The bank’s board had relationships with both groups. As the Massachusetts Democrat departed office in 2013, Barney Frank, a co-author of the Dodd-Frank Act passed in response to the 2008 financial crisis, joined the bank’s board. Ivanka Trump also worked as a director.
On March 12, authorities in charge of oversight lost trust in the management of the New York-based lender. Although prosecutors have been looking at its activities with crypto clients, the reason is unclear.
“Their downfall came when they got into this crypto business,” Al D’Amato, the former senator for New York, who was a director from 2005 to 2021, said last week. “They took their eyes off of that small entrepreneur.”
