As Reuters notes:

An independent U.S. senator on Friday introduced a bill that would give the government the power to identify and break up financial firms that are "too big to fail," an idea that is catching on.

"If an institution is too big to fail, it is too big to exist," said Senator Bernie Sanders in a statement.

"We should break them up so they are no longer in a position to bring down the entire economy," he said.

Sanders is an independent outside the U.S. political mainstream. But he is not the only one looking at break-ups.

Representative Paul Kanjorski, the Democratic chairman of the capital markets subcommittee in the U.S. House of Representatives, is working on a break-up power amendment.

It would give a new government systemic risk council break-up power, with clearance from the president.

"It's the natural action of capital to grow and exceed. Now we're going to contain it," Kanjorski told CNBC television.

For background on the too big to fail issue, see this, this and this.

Sanders' legislation would give