Some of the most conservative and liberal members of the United States Senate have joined hands in the hopes of cracking down on executive compensation and future taxpayer-funded bank bailouts after Silicon Valley Bank’s sudden collapse. 

Senators Warren, Hawley, Cortez Masto, and Braun recently introduced a bill that would require the federal government to claw back executive compensation in the wake of bank failures. 

The Failed Bank Executives Clawback Act would “require the FDIC to claw back from bank executives all or part of the compensation they have received over the five-year period preceding a bank’s insolvency.”

Inspiration for the bill was born out of the Silicon Valley Bank failure and the actions of its executive leadership team. In the days before the collapse, CEO Greg Becker cashed out his stock in the company, netting a profit of more than $2 million. On the day the bank collapsed, the company handed out tens of millions of dollars in bonuses to its nearly 9,000 employees. 

“Americans are sick and tired of fat cat bankers paying themselves handsomely while risking other people’s hard earned money,” Ms. Warren said in a statement. “It’s time for Congress to step up and strengthen the law so bank executives bear the cost of failure, not line their pockets and walk away scot-free.”

Ms. Warren’s criticism of bank executives has been a hallmark of her career — from her early days as a law professor to a presidential candidate. Yet her partnership with Messrs. Hawley and Braun signifies a growing urgency among Republicans to join in the fight against corporate abuses. 

“Bank executives who make risky investments with customers’ money shouldn’t be permitted to profit in the good times, and then avoid financial consequences when things go south,” Mr. Hawley said. “This legislation puts the executives’ own profits on the line, and that’s exactly as it should be.”

Punchbowl News reported that after reading the text of the bill, some other Republicans are interested in the legislation. Senator Tills said he was “open to the concept” of such a bill. Senator Crapo — a former chairman of the banking committee — said he doesn’t “see a problem with the regulatory authorities being able to claw back that kind of compensation.”

Congressmen Bryan Steil and Blaine Luetkemeyer — both of whom sit on the financial services committee — said they also are looking at the legislation. 

When the Biden administration announced that the Federal Insurance Deposit Commission would cover SVB’s losses and make depositors whole, many criticized the move as a bailout by another name. Although executives were fired and stockholders lost everything, the billions of dollars in deposits were mostly made by well-funded venture capital-backed startups.

Messrs. Hawley and Braun want to go even further than Ms. Warren in making sure that taxpayers do not bear the brunt of these kinds of bailouts for millionaires. 

They recently introduced legislation that would protect community banks — small, regional firms that serve the kinds of rural communities represented by the two men — from being forced to impose higher fees on customers in order to cover for the losses of large banks like SVB and Signature Bank, which also failed.  

“Community banks and their customers in Indiana should not be on the hook for bailing out Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank for their risky financial decisions,” Mr. Braun said in a statement. “We need to make sure responsible community banks and regular Americans are not footing the bill for President Biden’s bank bailout.”

Even some of the parties’ more centrist members support a form of the clawback legislation. Senator Warner — who voted for a 2018 banking deregulation bill that, some argue, helped lead to the SVB collapse — said he supports Ms. Warren and Mr. Hawley’s bill. 

The populist strain of the GOP has been especially prevalent in recent fights over corporate abuses — not just the failures of a few banks. In a rail contract dispute last year, many Republicans voted with their Democratic colleagues to stop the Biden administration from imposing the agreement without mandated sick days, over the objection of the unions.  

Just last month, Senator Vance decried the special treatment given to rail corporations in the wake of the East Palestine crash. He said those same companies’ wanton disregard for public safety led him to work with Democratic colleagues to crack down on the industry.