Barney Frank to GOP: Man Up on Financial Reform

Flickr/<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/worldeconomicforum/4317682779/">World Economic Forum</a>

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.), chair of the powerful House financial services committee, has issued a challenge to Senate Republicans: If GOPers want to kneecap an independent consumer protection agency, they should do it in public, not behind closed doors. “Procedurally, the Senate Republicans are killing this or watering it down,” Frank told Mother Jones. “Senate Republicans should stand up publicly and oppose it. At the very least, they have to do that. And there’s going to be public reaction against that.”

Over the weekend, Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn.), the banking committee’s chairman and leader on financial reform, circulated a plan to create a watered-down consumer-protection agency within the Treasury Department. Frank, who helped pass a financial-reform bil last year that included an independent Consumer Financial Protection Agency, called Dodd’s proposal “weaker than I was hoping.” Frank added that the draft’s stipulation that certain rule-writing by the proposed consumer agency would require approval from a separate risk-management council “is a terrible idea.” He also lamented that the consumer agency wouldn’t have full authority over payday lenders and debt collection and settlement companies.

If a watered-down version of a consumer-protection agency does emerge in the Senate’s final financial-reform bill, Frank said he will fight to make sure a consumer agency with independence and increased authority for consumer protection makes it onto the president’s desk. “I’m gonna do everything I can” to make sure the House’s Consumer Financial Protection Agency survives, Frank vowed. “I want [Republicans] to take a public vote at the very least.”

WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

payment methods

WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate