Plaid has hired former Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. Chair Jelena McWilliams as its president of corporate and external affairs, the fintech announced Thursday on its blog.

In a post Thursday, Plaid CEO Zach Perret called McWilliams a “consistent voice for transparency, consumer protection, and innovation.”

“Her experience will be invaluable as we help the industry continue to innovate at Plaid and as an industry,” Perret said.

McWilliams acknowledged the move in a Thursday post on LinkedIn. She led the FDIC from 2018 to 2021, resigning amid a power struggle with other board members at the agency — specifically, former Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Director Rohit Chopra and her eventual successor, Martin Gruenberg, after a partisan debate over a potential revision to bank merger policy.

McWilliams moved to law firm Cravath, Swaine & Moore, where she anchored the firm’s Washington, D.C., office. During her tenure, she served as trustee in the bankruptcy case of fintech middleman Synapse, and disclosed that the company’s partner banks were owed $85 million more than what was being held for them.

McWilliams’ Cravath bio page had been taken down by Thursday.

“Jelena brings a rare combination of policy depth, legal experience, and a deep understanding of how financial systems work, and how to make them better,” Perret said in a separate LinkedIn post Thursday. “At a time when the pace of innovation in financial services has never been faster and consumers are demanding more control, transparency, and trust, Jelena’s leadership will be a huge accelerant for our work.”

McWilliams’ presence in the fintech industry may still pull some sway at the FDIC. The agency’s current chair, Travis Hill, served as an adviser to McWilliams, and later, worked as her deputy of policy.