The SEC is one of the most captive government organizations out there. It's a complete revolving door between the banking industry and the SEC. Executives at the major banks basically do a tour at the SEC as part of their career path, where of course they grease the skids for the banks the entire time. I see this in DoD, but to a lesser extent. There are many executives from the big defense companies in the Pentagon and Executive Branch. Tons of lobbyists too, of course.
A lot of folks are totally ignorant that this is going on. There are stories from the 2008 crash of a few maverick gov't lifers at the SEC attempting to confront the big banks over it and basically being intimidated and run out of the meetings. Recall that during the 2008 crash our politicians told us only the whiz kids at the banks that had caused the issue in the first place could possibly "unwind" it without destroying the global economy further, so we needed to give them bags of cash and hope for the best. This exactly how the banks use the government to make themselves "too big to fail."
A large number of ignorant poor Americans believed this and still defend the big banks to this day.