U.S. Congressman Patrick McHenry, representing North Carolina’s 10th Congressional District, has been officially named the new chairman of the U.S. House Committee on Financial Services, after serving on the committee since first elected in 2005.
McHenry’s appointment was expected as N.C. Republicans take on high-visibility leadership roles in the new Republican-controlled U.S. House of Representatives.
He served as the Finance Committee’s ranking member in the last Congressional session where he most recently announced, with former Chair Maxine Waters, D-CA, that they will hold bipartisan hearings into the demise of FTX, a cryptocurrency giant.
At an initial hearing on the matter, McHenry told his colleagues, “There is no sugarcoating it. The collapse has been a dumpster fire. Users left out to dry. Ecosystem in limbo.”
McHenry, 46, who represents a district just west of Charlotte around Gastonia, was chief deputy whip to Republican Whip Steve Scalise, of Louisiana, from 2014 to 2019. McHenry is seen as a rising star in Republican leadership on Capitol Hill, but decided to remove himself from the whip race earlier this month.
“House Republicans will retake the majority this November, and the next Congress will be defined by divided government. As a result, I will best be able to serve our conference as the Chairman of the Financial Services Committee,” McHenry told The Hill.
McHenry also served one term in the N.C. House from 2003 to 2005.