After the House agreed to the Senate provision providing that the SEC could become self-funding, Senate conferees had doubts about SEC self-fuding being outside the congressional approproiation process. Senator Richard Shelby proposed an amendment that would give appropriators a role in the process. The amendment was not voted on since Senator Dodd wanted to hear from Senator Schumer on the amendment. Senator Schumer has been a proponent of SEC self-funding.
In an earlier statement, Senator Shelby said that the legislation contains a surprising self-funding provision that will give the SEC complete control over the size and allocation of its budget. Let me repeat that, said the Senator, the Democrats are going to give the SEC virtual budget autonomy from Congressional oversight after the SEC dropped the ball in the Madoff and Stanford frauds.