Hearing with SBA Administrator Guzman on Agency Accountability — September 17, 2024

Summary

A House Committee on Small Business press release dated September 17, 2024, announcing that Chairman Roger Williams would hold a hearing the next day with Small Business Administration (SBA) Administrator Guzman on agency accountability. It reprints a September 16, 2024 Fox News article by Charles Creitz saying Republicans planned to question Isabel Casillas Guzman about the SBA's voter registration memorandum of understanding with the Michigan Department of State under Executive Order 14019. The article quotes Williams, an SBA spokesperson who calls the agency's response cooperative, and ranking member Nydia Velazquez, who calls the inquiry partisan. It adds that the committee would ask about ending active collection of COVID-era loans under $100,000.

Summary drafted by a model from the document's text below and checked by script against that text before publication. It is a navigation aid, not a reading of what the document proves. Where AI is used

Full text

Press Releases

ICYMI: Chairman Williams, Committee on Small Business to Hold Hearing with SBA Administrator Guzman on Agency Accountability Washington,
 September 17, 2024 WASHINGTON, D.C. – Tomorrow, Congressman Roger Williams (TX-25), Chairman of the House Committee on Small Business, will hold a hearing to hear directly from Small Business Administration (SBA) Administrator Guzman on how the Agency has failed to follow its mission statement and support small businesses. In Case You Missed It: “Republicans plan to confront Biden’s small business chief on electioneering concerns, loan forgiveness” Fox News Charles Creitz September 16, 2024 At a scheduled House hearing on Wednesday, Republicans plan to grill Small Business Administrator Isabel Casillas Guzman over what they have characterized as the agency’s behavior in regard to claims of taxpayer-funded electioneering in swing-state Michigan. GOP Texas Rep. Roger Williams, chair of the House Small Business Committee, said Monday that Guzman will be asked directly about alleged agency efforts to register voters in Democrat-heavy precincts of the Wolverine State. “The Small Business Administration has lacked transparency and stonewalled committee oversight at every turn,” Williams said. “The administrator must answer directly to our members about what we are hearing from our constituents back home, particularly about why small business concerns are being ignored within the Biden-Harris administration …” Williams and his Senate counterpart, Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, began demanding documents and other information in May over what the SBA had called its “first-ever” voter registration agreement with Michigan officials. The SBA in March had forged a memorandum of understanding with the Michigan Department of State, pursuant to President Biden’s Executive Order 14019, which promotes access to voting. Since then, Williams and committee Republicans have been demanding information, including documents and travel schedules of top agency officials. The letter from the two lawmakers also cited Guzman as the “most-traveled” Cabinet member. To date, the committee has said SBA’s compliance has been markedly insufficient, with lawmakers claiming the agency has “slow-rolled … and wasted time producing documents that were either nonresponsive to the Committee’s requests or duplicative.” The agency is “diverting its resources away from assisting Main Street so it can register Democratic voters,” Williams said. In August, an SBA spokesperson argued that the agency has provided “extensive testimony, briefings, transcribed interviews, documents and other information in response to congressional inquires, including the Committee’s most recent subpoena.” “We are continuing the work to fulfill the subpoena beyond our initial document production. Any suggestion that the agency is conducting improper work or that its response has been anything other than cooperative is simply not true,” the spokesperson added. Democrats on the panel, meanwhile, have dismissed the majority’s demands and said their behavior tarnishes the panel’s record. The House Small Business Committee has otherwise “prided itself in bipartisan cooperation to help American entrepreneurs,” ranking member Nydia Velazquez, D-N.Y., told Fox News Digital in June. “Unfortunately, with [these] subpoenas, Republicans have rejected these principles to pursue a partisan inquiry,” Velazquez said. However, others have countered that Democrats are politicizing the committee, as a source with knowledge of the committee’s work pointed to at least five derogatory mentions of the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 in the committee’s last session. Velazquez and Rep. Judy Chu, D-Calif., had invoked the conservative advocacy group’s work to rebut Republican amendments aimed at reducing regulatory burdens on small business. Democrats have sought to link Republican officeholders and former President Trump to Project 2025 as a form of criticism. While several of Trump's former Cabinet secretaries and top White House senior aides are authors of the project, Trump has denied having any connection to it. Williams said that instead of voter registration in Michigan or other related concerns, the SBA should focus on its founding mission. “The American taxpayers deserve to know the truth about who the SBA is truly working for, because the last few years have been a disaster for Main Street America,” he said Monday. Fox News Digital has also learned the committee will question Guzman on the agency’s reported decision to end active collection of COVID-era small business loans under $100,000 while the agency saw billions of loan dollars accidentally go to fraudulent concerns. The committee also plans to address Vice President Harris’ small business tax deduction proposals and how witnesses may believe it meshes with potential plans to allow a current 20% small business tax deduction to expire. ###

File and source

File

407079_2024-09-17_icymi-chairman-williams-committee-on-small-bu.html

Size

28,364 bytes

SHA-256

81d4c028b64ebd8d4f0b2db233017260cbd0c2267cb2e344e85b46df99ab3de1

Our copy

407079_2024-09-17_icymi-chairman-williams-committee-on-small-bu.html

Original

No public link identified.