| Dear Katy, Last week was the 10-year anniversary of the demise of Lehman Brothers, which marked the collapse of Wall Street's scheme of speculation and outright fraud that shattered the global economy.1 In the wake of the financial crisis, millions lost jobs and livelihoods. With Washington's help, Wall Street foreclosed – in many cases, illegally – on houses and stole homes from countless families. But big banks got bigger, and not a single banker went to jail.2 Today, it's clear that most of our leaders in Washington have learned nothing. Trump and Republicans have already started gutting Wall Street reform and packing regulators with allies of the big banks, and too many corporate Democrats have joined them. We can't let Democrats forget the lessons of the crash and give up on the unfinished business of Wall Street reform. Stand with Sen. Warren: Finish the job of Wall Street reform. Click here to sign the petition. Big bank propagandists are already at work. Former Treasury Secretaries Hank Paulson and Timothy Geithner and former Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke recently published an article defending their unjust bank bailouts.3 But behind their convoluted arguments and technical language lies a simple truth: The well-connected and powerful decided to prevent collapse by sacrificing everyday Americans who did nothing wrong and bailing out the bankers who caused the mess without any punishment. Today, the big banks are bigger than ever and the rule of law only seems to apply to working people and especially communities of color. While racist policing and anti-immigrant crackdowns continue, megabanks like Wells Fargo repeatedly break the law and yet grow and become more profitable. The largest banks are even bigger than they once were, and threats like hedge funds and high-speed trading threaten jobs once more.4,5 Stand with Sen. Warren: Finish the job of Wall Street reform. Click here to sign the petition. Progressive champions like Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Rep. Maxine Waters, among others, have put forward concrete legislation as part of a bold agenda to crack down on Wall Street. That means defending the Dodd-Frank financial reform law, preserving the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, ending the Wall Street lobbyist corruption in Washington, demanding that Wall Street leaders whose companies break the law go to jail – and finally breaking up the too-big-to-fail banks. There is no excuse for any Democrat to oppose this agenda. Now is the time for every single Democrat to recommit themselves to finishing the work of Wall Street reform. Stand with Sen. Warren: Finish the job of Wall Street reform. Click below to sign the petition: https://act.credoaction.com/sign/10_years_wall_street?t=8&akid=30121%2E12967895%2EBa60ix Thank you for speaking out, Josh Nelson, Co-Director
CREDO Action from Working Assets Add your name: References: - Matt Stoller, "The Bailouts for the Rich Are Why America Is So Screwed Right Now," Vice, Sep. 13, 2018.
- Ibid.
- Ibid.
- Marcus Stanley, "Bernanke, Geithner, and Paulson's Lessons of the Crash," The American Prospect, Sep. 13, 2018.
- Zach Carter, "Why Does Wells Fargo Still Exist?" HuffPost, Aug. 25, 2018.
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