The U.S. House of Representatives voted 333-92 Wednesday to pass the Federal Reserve Transparency Act, marking the second time in three years the House has passed a bill aimed at auditing the Fed's monetary policy.
Sponsored by Rep. Paul Broun, R-Ga., the bill received larger bipartisan support than its 2012 incarnation, seeing 106 Democrats and all but one Republican vote in its favor this time around, reported Reuters.
"This is a vital piece of legislation that will help to usher in a new era of transparency in this nation's monetary policy," Broun told The Hill. "The Federal Reserve is a creation of Congress, and it must therefore be subject to the oversight and regulation of Congress."
Colloquially known as "Audit the Fed," H.R. 24 will now move to the Democratic-controlled Senate, where it's expected to meet strong resistance likely resulting in its death.
If passed, the bill will require the comptroller general to complete an audit of the board of governors and Fed banks within one year and submit the findings to Congress, and would also act to repeal a limitation that shielded the Fed's monetary policy decisions, according to Reuters.
However, Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid previously said he would not let such a bill come to the Senate floor, and a Senate Democratic aide told Reuters there are no plans to consider the bill before the end of the year.
But for the bill to pass, it would require the Senate to act before the newly elected Congress reconvenes in January.
Former Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, authored the previous 2012 version, which also passed the House. Paul's son, Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., introduced companion legislation into the Senate in February 2013, where it has 30 co-sponsors from both major parties but has not yet been assigned to a committee for consideration.
While the Fed is subjected to various audits, current law still exempts some of its actions from certain aspects of an audit.
In a 2011 audit - the first of its kind in the history of the Fed - the Governmental Accountability Office found that more than $16 trillion had been distributed to foreign banks and corporations during and after the 2008 financial crisis for what it called "financial assistance," according to Forbes.
Supporters of Audit the Fed legislation argue that the Fed's current independent monetary policy has and will continue to generate unnecessary and detrimental inflation.
Current Audit the Fed legislation proposes more comprehensive audits designed to dive deeper into the Fed's monetary policy.
