Seems like Wall Street has found a friend in the Republican Party. According to a research done by The Center for Responsive Politics, Wall Street has moderately increased its donations to Democrats, while drastically increasing the payout to Republicans in congress. The Boehners of the world are finally seeing the rewards of their fight against Financial Reform materialized.
The research, that focused on the 2009 and 2010 donations by Wall Street, found in 2009 when the talks about Financial Reform were just talks, Democrats received the majority of all donations from the Finance, Insurance and Real Estate Sectors.
The Center also looked into the donations of Commercial Banks and Securities and Investment companies, and found the same to be true. Democrats were happy in 2009.
Then 2010 rolled around, and so did Financial Reform legislations. And the GOP, led by the Boehner, increased their opposition to any regulations of Wall Street. In one of his more famous speeches, the Boehner told American Bankers Association to fight!
“Don’t let those little punk staffers take advantage of you and stand up for yourselves. All of us are hearing from our friends and constituents on lack of credit, you can’t get a loan, the more your government takes and taxes, the more regulations you have to comply with the more cost you have there and less amount you are going to have available to loan to customers.”
Boehner however, wasn’t the only GOP congressman working hard for his increased donations from Wall Street. Mike Pence, (R) for Indiana’s 6th Congressional District had this to say;
“This bill can be summed up in two words: ‘government control’ and it will serve as the latest piece of the president’s job-killing agenda. This represents another defeat for Hoosier families, small businesses and family farms, who continue to wonder when Washington Democrats will set aside their big government programs and work with Republicans on ideas that can actually put Americans back to work.”
And Mitch McConnell, the Republican Senate Minority Leader did not want the Senate to even talk about Wall Street Reforms. In one of his more mind boggling statement on the subject, McConnell said;
“We can solve this problem. But we wont solve the problem if we vote for cloture tonight. A vote for cloture is a vote that says we’re done listening to the American people on this issue. And a vote against ending this debate is a vote for bipartisanship.”
Huh? In other words, if we continue to filibuster this issue, we will somehow eventually became bipartisan or the Financial Reform issue will die. Either way, McConnell earned his pay-raise from Wall Street.
It’s a simple equation. Democrats voted for the American people and Financial reform and saw no real change in their donations. Republicans went to bat for Big Banks and Wall Street and received their pay in the form of huge donations from Big Banks and Wall Street.
The report shows the following:
2009/2010 – 1st Quarter: Financial Sector:-
- Democrats donations from Financial, Insurance and Real Estate went from $10.1 million in 2009 to $10.5 million in 2010. In the same quarter, this sector’s payout to Republicans went from $5.1 million in 2009 to $16.9 million in 2010
Commercial Banks:
- Democrats went from $747,000 to $862,000 while Republicans pay increased from $505,000 to $1.4 million
Securities/Investment:
- Democrats went from $2.8 million in 2009 to $3 million in 2010, while Republicans went from $881,000 in 2009 to $5 million in 2010
Download the full report here.
When Democrats fight for the American people, the American people win. When Republicans fight for Big Banks and Wall Street, Republicans win.
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