President Trump Issues Executive Order to Establish Task Force on Market Integrity and Consumer Fraud

President Donald J. Trump issued an Executive Order instructing the Attorney General (“AG”) to establish a Task Force on Market Integrity and Consumer Fraud (the “Task Force”). The goal of the Task Force is to provide guidance on financial fraud and other crimes, including cyber fraud, that target members of the public.

Specifically, the Task Force will give recommendations to the AG on fraud enforcement activities across the DOJ regarding (i) actions to improve inter-agency cooperation in investigating and prosecuting financial crimes, (ii) actions to bolster communication among Federal, State, local and tribal authorities with respect to the detection, investigation and prosecution of financial crimes, and (iii) changes in “rules, regulations, or policy, or recommendations to . . . Congress regarding legislative measures, to improve the effective investigation and prosecution” of financial crimes.

The Task Force will terminate and replace the Financial Fraud Enforcement Task Force created by Executive Order 13519 on November 17, 2009, which is now revoked.

In remarks delivered in Washington D.C., SEC Chair Jay Clayton expressed support for the establishment of the Task Force. Mr. Clayton reaffirmed the importance of inter-agency cooperation when it comes to protecting retail investors, and underscored some of the actions that the SEC recently undertook to confront retail securities fraud. In particular, Mr. Clayton highlighted retail enforcement strategies, emergency actions, and cyber and initial coin offering (“ICO”) fraud. With respect to retail enforcement strategy, Mr. Clayton discussed the Retail Strategy Task Force created by the SEC in 2017 to provide additional protection for Main Street investors by developing strategies for dealing with various types of wrongdoing that most impact retail investors. Mr. Clayton also stated that in response to bad actors utilizing new technologies to commit ICO fraud, the Enforcement Division created a Cyber Unit to deal specifically with cyber-related crimes.

Lofchie Comment: There seem to be two major differences between the newly issued order and the Executive Order that it replaced.

First, the former Task Force included membership from a complete A-Z of agencies making it unwieldy at best. The reconstituted Task Force can call upon the agency alphabet as is needed.

Second, the former Task Force was established, in large measure, to address concerns related to the financial crisis. The new Task Force is forward-looking; it now includes fraud on the government, cyberfraud, fraud against senior citizens, health care fraud, and fraud involving cryptocurrencies.