Special Counsel Petal Walker was featured in an episode of Marketplace, which discusses diversity issues among financial regulators.
Ms. Walker was chief counsel to a commissioner on the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. She grew up in the 1980s in Jamaica, Queens—a diverse, poorer neighborhood on the outskirts of New York City. Walker said that experience influenced her perspective, because she realized that too much market risk could lead to a crisis with spikes in unemployment. She said she was very aware of how the decisions financial regulators made would ultimately affect individuals who may never get a seat at the table.