Senate Probes Fed Outage Amid Staffing Cuts Concerns
The Senate Banking Committee has launched an investigation into a recent Federal Reserve outage that lasted at least 48 hours, starting on August 5, 2026. The inquiry is centered around the cause and resolution of the outage, with particular focus on whether reduced supervision workforce contributed to the issue.
Senator Elizabeth Warren, leading the Senate Banking Committee, has sent a request for information to Federal Reserve Vice Chair for Supervision Michelle Bowman. Warren wants to know if the incident occurred, when it was resolved, and what caused it, including whether it stemmed from a previously known IT issue.
The senator is also investigating the impact of a 30% staff reduction in the Fed's Division of Supervision and Regulation on bank oversight efficacy. She has written to Bowman, Comptroller of the Currency Jonathan Gould, and Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation Chairman Travis Hill about examiner workforce cuts at their agencies.