WASHINGTON – President Joe Biden’s choice to head one of the agencies responsible for overseeing the banking sector was the subject of fierce questioning Thursday from Republican senators, who tried to label Saule Omarova as someone who would nationalize the American banking system.

Omarova, 55, was appointed in September to be the country’s next currency controller. If confirmed, she would be the first woman and person of color to run the 158-year-old agency.

Omarova’s appointment met with stiff opposition from the banking industry as well as from Sen. Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, the top Republican on the Senate Banking Committee. A long-time scholar and renowned expert in financial regulation, Omarova has published several articles during her career in which she proposed far-reaching changes to the banking system.

“Taken in their entirety, his ideas constitute a socialist manifesto for US financial services,” Toomey said.

The banking lobby is overwhelmingly against his appointment. In an interview with The Associated Press this week, Omarova said their opposition was largely due to fears that she was a harsh regulator for Wall Street and the banks.

Much of the audience’s attention was focused on two moderate Democratic senators who sit on the Banking Committee: Jon Tester of Montana and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona. Republicans are united in their opposition to the nomination of Omarova and Toomey and others have tried to portray Omarova as a radical choice in order to dissuade Tester and Sinema from supporting them.

In his questioning, Toomey appeared to remain skeptical about Omarova’s appointment, saying he still had “significant concerns” even after meeting her in private. Toomey focused most of his questions on Omarova’s previous opposition to a bipartisan law that removed part of the framework passed after the 2008 financial crisis. Toomey was a co-sponsor of that law.

Omarova said she now sees the merits of the law, especially how it has reduced the regulatory red tape needed for small community banks.

Omarova was born in Kazakhstan while part of the Soviet Union and immigrated to the United States in 1991. She has worked primarily as a lawyer and, in recent years, at Cornell University as a professor of law. Over the years, she has testified several times as an expert witness on financial regulation. She worked briefly in the administration of President George W. Bush.

Republicans on the committee focused their questions or statements on his past writings and public comments.

Last year, she published an article arguing for an overhaul of the country’s banking system that would expand the role of the Federal Reserve by allowing the central bank to hold consumer deposits. Proponents of such a move say the Fed could extend credit faster if needed to individual accounts during an economic downturn. After the Great Recession, banks accumulated deposits and lent little to rebuild their balance sheets.