President Bush Picks Two More SEC Commissioners

President George W. Bush has announced [1] that he intends to nominate Harvey Goldschmid and Roel Campos to the open positions on the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Both are Democrats. By law, the five-member SEC can have no more than three commissioners from one party. Currently, three seats are filled by Republicans -- Chairman Harvey Pitt and Commissioners Cynthia Glassman and Paul Atkins.

Mr. Campos is senior vice president and general counsel of El Dorado Communications in Houston, Texas. He was an assistant U.S. attorney in California and he practiced law with Richman, Lawrence, Mann, Greene, Arbiter, as well as Rudin, Appel and Rosenfeld. He also founded a radio broadcasting company and was backed by the National Council of La Raza in its efforts to add an Hispanic to the SEC.

Mr. Goldschmid is a law professor at Columbia University in New York City. He served as SEC general counsel and top adviser to former SEC Chairman Arthur Levitt in 1998 and 1999, while on a leave of absence from Columbia. At the SEC, Goldschmid was instrumental in developing Regulation FD (fair disclosure), and he played a key role in the SEC's push for tougher rules on auditor independence. In addition to teaching, Mr. Goldschmid is at attorney with the law firm of Weil, Gotshal & Manges, the firm that is representing Enron Corp. in its bankruptcy proceedings.

Both Ms. Glassman and Mr. Atkins have backgrounds from accounting firms. Economist Cynthia Glassman was formerly a principal at Ernst & Young. Paul Atkins was a partner at PricewaterhouseCoopers.

-Rosemary Schlank