WASHINGTON – Stating "there is no next year" for him, Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd – who is retiring at the end of this Congress – called for a calming of partisan anger as debate on the bank reform bill finally began yesterday.
Republican senators, who had blocked the debate for three days through a filibuster, agreed to begin the debate after the Democrats dropped a $50 billion assessment on large financial institutions that would have been used to fund the resolution of big banks that pose a threat to the financial system. The Republicans said the fund amounted to a guarantee of a government bailout that would encourage risky behavior by Wall Street firms.
But the Republicans continue to pose opposition to major provisions of the bill, which will be debated in full next week. Among those are the consumer financial protection agency they say will intrude into every area of commerce, and to new restrictions of financial derivatives they feel will hurt mainstream financing, as well as Wall Street.
The bill has little that would impact credit unions directly. The credit union lobby has successfully gotten all credit unions with less than $10 billion in assets (only three credit unions exceed that figure) from being examined by the consumer agency.
Republicans say the reason they kept voting against starting the debate was because the bill wasn't ready. They now say they will work on the bill through amendments on the Senate floor.
Debate is expected to continue on the Senate floor for about two weeks as a series of amendments are introduced.
