Senator Elizabeth Warren, the most senior Democrat on the US Senate Banking Committee, has written to Barclays demanding urgent answers over what she called the bank's "apparent failure to meaningfully investigate" ties between its former chief executive Jes Staley and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. In a letter co-signed by Congress members Ro Khanna and Raja Krishnamoorthi and addressed to Barclays chair Nigel Higgins, Warren gave the bank two weeks to respond to questions about its executive vetting process and whether it had probed Staley's extensive personal and professional relationship with Epstein, who died in 2019 while awaiting trial on child sex trafficking charges. The lawmakers also cautioned that operating in the United States — where Barclays holds roughly $200 billion in assets — is a privilege contingent on sound governance, raising the stakes for a bank already under scrutiny following a UK court ruling last year that upheld Staley's ban from the British financial industry.