Financial Services

In 2008, as the financial markets collapsed, President Bush, along with then Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, called on Congress to approve unprecedented intervention by the U.S. Treasury to bail out Wall Street.

I believed the financial crisis was bigger than a few failing banks or a stock market in disarray. Americans were losing their homes and retirement savings. Some feared they would not be able to access the loans needed to send their kids to college, or secure the lines of credit to run their farms and small businesses. With these ordinary Americans in mind, I voted for the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act, which authorized the federal government to loan money under the Troubled Assets Relief Program (TARP) to certain financial institutions so they could resume lending to everyday Americans.

Unlike the original Bush plan, which was nothing more than a $700 billion handout to Wall Street, this legislation had strict independent oversight provisions, revenue sharing for taxpayers, and limits on executive compensation. It also did more to help those at risk of home foreclosure by allowing the government to renegotiate mortgage terms. As someone who lost his home as a child, I fought for this provision.


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