Thanks to the help of 16 Senate Democrats and Sen. Angus King (I-Maine), a Wall Street deregulation measure disguised as a “community banking” bill is barreling toward passage—but Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) vowed Wednesday to not let the bill sail through without forcing votes on a series of amendments aimed at showing Americans whose side their lawmakers are really on.
“The Senate is expected to pass the #BankLobbyistAct—with Democratic support. But I’m not going down without a fight.”
—Sen. Elizabeth Warren”The fight over the Bank Lobbyist Act isn’t over yet,” Warren wrote on Twitter, unveiling 17 amendments that, if approved, would uphold strict oversight of big banks and shield consumers from Wall Street fraud and abuse. “I’m not going to roll over and play dead for the big banks.”
First introduced last November by Sen. Mike Crapo (R-Idaho), the officially named “Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief, and Consumer Protection Act” (S.2155) could hit the Senate floor for a final vote as soon as Thursday after it easily cleared a procedural hurdle earlier this week.
Far from what its title suggests, progressive lawmakers and independent analysts argue the legislation would dismantle many consumer protections, provide huge gifts to Wall Street firms, and—according to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO)—significantly increase the likelihood of future taxpayer-funded bank bailouts.
In an effort to let the American people know whether their senators are on the side of “working families or the big banks,” Warren announced her plan on Wednesday to push for votes on amendments to the bill that, if implemented in its current form, would “turn over the keys to our economy to the same people who crashed it ten years ago.”
“The Senate is expected to pass the #BankLobbyistAct—with Democratic support. But I’m not going down without a fight,” Warren declared.
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