Hensarling slams Boeing CEO for refusing to testify

House Financial Services Committee chairman Jeb Hensarling (R-Texas) on Wednesday slammed Boeing CEO James McNerney for declining to testify before his committee at a planned hearing on the Export-Import (Ex-Im) bank.

Hensarling said he was disappointed that Boeing would not be on hand for the hearing, which he vowed will be held before the bank’s charter expires on June 30.

{mosads}“Boeing is by far the Export-Import Bank’s biggest beneficiary and its most ardent supporter. So it is extremely disappointing that Boeing’s CEO refuses to appear before our committee for a hearing about the public policy and economic rationale for the Bank,” Hensarling said in a statement.

The chairman noted that McNerney is scheduled to speak at the Ex-Im bank’s annual conference this week in Washington.

“It is both curious and disappointing that Boeing’s CEO can make the time to appear at what amounts to nothing more than a pep rally for Ex-Im’s reauthorization, but is unwilling to make the case in a public forum open to congressional questioning,” Hensarling said.

Tim Keating, Boeing’s senior vice president of government operations, countered that “senior Boeing executives have testified multiple times on the importance of the Export-Import Bank to the U.S. aerospace industry’s ability to compete for international sales and grow U.S. jobs.”

“Boeing executives also have engaged in lengthy discussions about Ex-Im in numerous group and individual meetings on the Hill, including with Chairman Hensarling,” Keating said. “Our views are well known and well documented, as are the views of hundreds of other U.S. exporters, both large and small, and the thousands of companies that supply large exporters like Boeing.”

A source familiar with the discussions between Boeing and the committee said that Boeing considered having McNerney testify, but asked the committee to consider a separate panel structure to avoid a confrontation with Delta, an important customer.

The source went on to say that Boeing asked if the committee would consider having an alternate senior Boeing official testify, but the committee staff was insistent that it had to be under their terms or not at all.

Hensarling said that the panel will still have hearings on the bank, “with at least one full committee hearing in late May or June.”

It is unclear whether Hensarling — who sides with Tea Party groups in opposing the bank as a form of “corporate welfare” — will move a reauthorization bill through his panel, which has jurisdiction on the issue.

Republicans are divided about whether to support the bank’s reauthorization. The bank’s GOP supporters have joined Democrats and the business community in arguing that it helps sustain U.S. jobs and grow business in emerging markets.

Delta Airlines has tried to argue that Ex-Im financing unfairly benefits Boeing while underscoring its competitors. Boeing and the bank reject those assertions, and a federal judge threw out Delta’s allegations in court.

Critics of the bank have nicknamed Ex-Im “the Bank of Boeing.”

Boeing receives about one-third of Ex-Im’s total loan commitments, according to a 2014 report from Standard & Poor.

— This story was updated at 6:42 p.m.