A leading senator involved in efforts to reform the government’s relationship with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac said yesterday that he sees “commonality” within the housing finance sector on how lawmakers should alter the government-sponsored enterprises, MorningConsult.com reported. “What I see happening, right now, is a real consolidation of ideas,” Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) said yesterday at Senate Banking Committee hearing. “It just seems to me that the thinking around what needs to happen on GSE reform is coming to a place where I truly believe we’re going to be able to pass a piece of legislation this year.” Corker has been active in the GSE debate for years and co-authored a reform measure with Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) that the Banking panel approved in 2014. He said he’s come to believe there’s agreement on the left and the right that a reform bill needs to include a paid-for and explicit, rather than implicit, government guarantee for catastrophic losses. Achieving that might be difficult for Republicans, Corker noted.
