Former Senate Banking Committee aide Elad Roisman has been confirmed by the Senate to serve a five-year term as a Republican member of the Securities and Exchange Commission, bringing the SEC back to full capacity for now.
Approved by an overwhelming vote of 85-14, Roisman replaces former Commissioner Michael Piwowar, who departed the agency in July.
Roisman previously served as Chief Counsel to the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee under Chairman Mike Crapo (R-ID). He also served as counsel to former SEC Commissioner Daniel Gallagher from 2012 to 2014. In addition, he worked as Chief Counsel for NYSE Euronext from 2010 to 2012, and as an associate with Milbank, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy LLP from 2006 to 2010.
The SEC will be losing the service of a Democratic commissioner later this year. Commissioner Kara Stein’s five-year term expired in 2017, but commissioners may serve up to 18 months beyond the expiration of their terms. A nominee has not yet been named for Stein.
Earlier reports suggested that Trump administration officials were focusing on a former SEC enforcement attorney Allison H. Lee to replace Stein. Lee served as a general attorney in the SEC’s Denver office from 2005 to 2013, followed by a 16-month stint at SEC headquarters as Stein’s legal counsel. In 2015 she returned to the Denver office as senior counsel of their Complex Financial Instruments unit. Since January 2018, Lee has been a corporate governance consultant with Congress Park Consulting, LLC in Washington, DC. Any delays in nominating and confirming Stein’s successor would take the agency back down to four commissioners, with three Republicans and one Democrat.
There’s no indication yet on when Roisman will be sworn in, but his confirmation brings the commission’s political split back to three Republicans and two Democrats and catapults him into the agency’s rulemaking on the Regulation Best Interest and other high profile initiatives.
