Warren claims SEC’s Atkins likely misled Congress over enforcement data

SEC chair Paul Atkins is under fire from Senator Elizabeth Warren, who says he “may have been deliberately trying” to mislead Congress about the agency’s enforcement activity.

US Senator Elizabeth Warren has accused Paul Atkins, the head of the Securities and Exchange Commission, of possibly lying to Congress about the agency’s enforcement numbers.

Warren, the top Democrat on the Senate Banking Committee, said in a letter to Atkins dated Wednesday that the SEC’s enforcement data for fiscal year 2025, released on April 7, raised “significant concerns” about his answers at a Feb. 12 congressional hearing.

“At the hearing, I specifically asked you to comment on publicly available data highlighting a decline in SEC enforcement activity,” Warren said. “In response, you demurred, stating that you were ‘not sure what data’ I was looking at.”

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