Michael Horowitz

Michael Horowitz is the inspector general for the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (Board) and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). He was appointed to that position by then-Chair Jerome Powell effective June 30, 2025. He leads the office’s approximately 130 person staff in promoting economy, efficiency, and effectiveness and preventing and detecting fraud, waste, and abuse in the Board’s and the CFPB’s programs and operations.

Mr. Horowitz also serves on the Pandemic Response Accountability Committee, which was created by Congress in March 2020 to oversee the now more than $5 trillion in federal pandemic-related emergency spending. He chaired the committee from April 2020 until February 2026.

Before his current appointment, Mr. Horowitz was the inspector general of the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) for 13 years following his nomination by the President and confirmation by the U.S. Senate in 2012. As DOJ inspector general, he was a member of the Intelligence Community Inspector General Forum. Mr. Horowitz was elected by his fellow inspectors general to serve as chair of the Council of the Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency, the umbrella organization comprising all 72 federal inspectors general, from 2015 to 2020.

Mr. Horowitz worked from 2002 to 2012 as a partner at the law firm of Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft LLP, where he focused his practice on white collar defense, internal investigations, and regulatory compliance. He also was a member of the Firm’s management committee from 2008 to 2012. During his time at Cadwalader, Mr. Horowitz was nominated by the President and confirmed by the U.S. Senate in 2003 to serve a 6-year term as a part-time commissioner on the U.S. Sentencing Commission. He also was a board member of the Ethics Resource Center and the Society for Corporate Compliance and Ethics.

Before his time in private practice, Mr. Horowitz worked in DOJ from 1991 to 2002. He served as an assistant U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York from 1991 to 1999, where he was the chief of the Public Corruption Unit and a deputy chief of the Criminal Division. In 1995, he was awarded the Attorney General’s Award for Distinguished Service, DOJ’s second highest award, for his work on a complex police corruption investigation. From 1999 to 2002, he worked in the DOJ Criminal Division at Main Justice in Washington, DC, first as a deputy assistant attorney general and then as chief of staff. Mr. Horowitz began his legal career as a law clerk for Judge John G. Davies of the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California and as an associate at Debevoise & Plimpton.

Mr. Horowitz earned his law degree, magna cum laude, from Harvard Law School and his Bachelor of Arts degree, summa cum laude, from Brandeis University.