Senators Cantwell and Feingold refused Senator Reid's demand to end the debate on financial reform!

[Better Believe It]

How the Financial Overhaul Vote Went Down
By DAMIAN PALETTA, GREG HITT, MICHAEL R. CRITTENDEN, and VICTORIA MCGRANE
May 19, 2010

WASHINGTON – More than 50 Senate Democrats walked out of a closed-door meeting in a room near the Senate floor Tuesday afternoon, and their puzzled looks conveyed the divisions growing within the caucus.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada had called the meeting to try to cajole his caucus to vote together for cloture, ending debate on the financial overhaul bill and clearing the way for a final vote on the measure. But several liberal lawmakers refused, saying they weren't being allowed to offer more amendments.

In the meeting, Mr. Reid told the other Democrats not to "lose sight of the big picture here," recounted Sen. Mark Pryor of Arkansas. (The big picture is that Wall Street appears to own Mr. Reid. BBI)

From the start, the Democrats needed at least a bit of GOP support. They needed 60 votes to end debate on the bill, but with 57 Democrats and two independent lawmakers who caucus with them, they were one vote short. On top of that, Sen. Arlen Specter was busy with last-minute – and ultimately futile -- campaigning in his home state of Pennsylvania to hold onto his Senate seat. That meant Sen. Reid had pick up the support of two Republicans while keeping the Democrats and independents united.

As lawmakers gathered in the Senate chamber, Mr. Reid immediately huddled with Sen. Maria Cantwell (D., Wash.), who had told reporters before she walked onto the Senate floor she would vote against cloture because she wanted stricter curbs on derivatives trading. Their conversation appeared animated, and the body language left little doubt that both sides were displeased. He turned and walked away while she sat in a chair, her arms crossed.

As lawmakers continued to vote, Democratic leaders realized they had other problems. Sen. Russell Feingold (D., Wis.) walked directly to the floor, caught the attention of officials tallying votes, told them "No," and marched right out of the chamber before anyone could intercede. Mr. Feingold had complained for weeks that the bill wasn't tough enough on big banks.

Ms. Cantwell stayed in her chair. Sen. Susan Collins, a centrist Republican from Maine, walked up and voted "yes," essentially canceling Ms. Cantwell's "no" vote.

Searching for more support, Mr. Reid walked over to a group of Republicans that included Maine's other senator, Olympia Snowe, another centrist. The two talked as Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky looking on.

Moments later, Mr. Reid and Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd of Connecticut were talking with Ms. Cantwell, who hadn't budged from her chair. Mr. Dodd asked if she wanted to speak with Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner. She didn't appear interested. Sen. Al Franken (D., Minn.) walked by and jokingly asked if she'd consider changing her vote if he threw a fund-raiser for her. She cracked a smile, but that was it.

Please read the full article at:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703691804575255080053190908.html?mod=WSJ_WSJ_US_News_3


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Cantwell bucks Democrats on financial reform vote
by Kyung M. Song
May 19, 2010

WASHINGTON -- Sen. Maria Cantwell on Wednesday once again defied her party on a procedural vote relating to financial reforms, blocking an attempt by Democrats to forge ahead with the Wall Street reform bill.

Cantwell joined Sen. Russ Feingold of Wisconsin as the only Democrats to vote against cutting off debate on the legislation. That could thwart Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's hopes of shepherding the bill into passage this week.

Cantwell was protesting because she couldn't get her colleagues to commit to voting on two of her amendments to the reform bill. One, which she sponsored with Republican Sen. John McCain, would resurrect the Glass-Steagall Act to ban financial firms from operating both commercial and investment banking.

Cantwell also sought to tighten sanctions for use of derivatives that aren't traded through central clearing to minimize their risks. Cantwell has persistently favored tougher regulation on financial firms than many of her fellow Democrats.

In January, Cantwell was one of 11 Democrats to vote against giving a second term to Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke for what she said was insufficient regulatory zeal. The Senate confirmed Bernanke with a 70-30 vote.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/politicsnorthwest/2011905824_cantwellbucksdemocratsonfinancialreformvote.html


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Feingold Statement on Voting 'No' on Ending Debate on the Financial Regulatory Reform Bill

Wednesday, May 19, 2010

“After thirty years of giving in to the wishes of Wall Street lobbyists, Congress needs to finally enact tough reforms to prevent Wall Street from driving our economy into the ditch again. We need to eliminate the risk posed to our economy by ‘too big to fail’ financial firms and to reinstate the protective firewalls between Main Street banks and Wall Street firms. Unfortunately, these key reforms are not included in the bill. The test for this legislation is a simple one - whether it will prevent another financial crisis. As the bill stands, it fails that test. Ending debate on the bill is finishing before the job is done.”

In 1999, Senator Feingold was one of eight senators to vote against legislation tearing down the firewall between Main Street banks and Wall Street investment banks and insurance companies. In 2008, Feingold opposed the Wall Street bailout in part because it failed “to reform the flawed regulatory structure that permitted this crisis to arise in the first place.”

http://feingold.senate.gov/record.cfm?id=325079


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Press Release of Senator Cantwell

Cantwell Votes to Continue Efforts to Strengthen Wall Street Reform Legislation
Says stopping debate now would result in lax reform of dark derivatives markets
Wednesday, May 19,2010

WASHINGTON, DC – Today U.S. Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA) voted to continue debate on financial regulatory reform legislation, saying that the bill as it stands fails to close loopholes on unregulated derivatives trading. Those loopholes, Cantwell said, were primarily responsible for the severe economic meltdown that has increased unemployment and cut off investment capital. Senate rules require 60 votes to stop debate; the move to end debate garnered only 57 votes. Cantwell was among 42 senators voting to continue debate on the regulatory reform bill.

The issue, Cantwell said, is ensuring transparency and oversight of the currently unregulated derivatives market. Even seemingly small loopholes can create structural flaws in the financial system that can cause tremendous damage in the long term as they are exploited by Wall Street. She likened the issue to building a dam.

“Even something like the Hoover Dam, with all the great concrete and all the great engineering … still has a problem if somebody drills a hole in the bottom of it,” Cantwell said in a Senate floor speech just after the vote. “This issue is a fundamental one. We won’t have reform if we don’t have exchange trading and clearing, if we don’t bring derivatives onto the same kind of mechanisms we have for other products in the financial markets. And if we don’t have that, then I don’t know what we’re doing out here in the context of what brought us into this crisis.”

Cantwell is seeking derivatives reforms including: minimum requirements for capital behind trades; transparency in pricing; real-time monitoring of trading activity; transparent valuation of derivatives; limits on speculation; and public transparency. The pending reform bill contains many strong provisions that Cantwell not only supports but co-authored. But she said the derivatives language in the current version of the bill retains loopholes that could once again cause serious financial disruption.

Senators Cantwell and Blanche Lincoln (D-AR) have coauthored an amendmentthat has not yet been considered by the Senate that tightens clearing requirements for trading derivatives. The amendment requires that all standardized swaps must be cleared and that failure to do so makes the swap unlawful and could void the swap.

Senators Cantwell and John McCain (R-AZ) have filed another amendment not yet debated that would reinstate the Glass-Steagall Act’s separation of commercial and investment banking. In her floor speech, Cantwell said she would like a vote on this measure, but that her primary concern was the derivatives issue.

Throughout the debate, Senator Cantwell has tirelessly fought to defeat efforts to weaken the legislation, and she has championed amendments that strengthen the bill, particularly in the areas of derivatives trading. Cantwell, a leader in the fight to prevent a repeat of the financial meltdown of 2008, and in previous years to end energy market manipulation, helped craft the tough derivatives language under consideration in the financial regulatory reform bill on the floor. She is fighting to strengthen that language further.

On May 17, the Senate passed an amendment co-sponsored by Cantwell that provides strong protections for investors while promoting small business startups vital to job creation.

On May 13, the Senate passed an amendment 61 to 38 submitted by Cantwell and Senator George LeMieux (R-FL) to remove the federal government’s ‘seal of approval’ from investment rating agencies and force federal regulators to develop more diverse and accurate measures of credit worthiness. Economists, regulators, and industry experts have agreed that an over-reliance on credit ratings contributed significantly to the recent economic crisis.

On May 6, the Senate unanimously passed Cantwell’s anti-manipulation amendment, which makes it easier for the Commodities Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) to deter and enforce manipulation in futures and derivatives markets. Under current law, the standard the CFTC must meet to prove market manipulation is so high that there has only been one successful prosecution in the past 35 years.
###

http://cantwell.senate.gov/news/record.cfm?id=325094


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Wall Street Reform Update: Cloture Vote Tomorrow
By: David Dayen
May 19, 2010

After a few more amendments to the Wall Street reform bill this evening (and a defeat for the Whitehouse amendment to allow states to cap interest rates on credit cards), Harry Reid set up a vote for cloture for tomorrow. He expects Arlen Specter to be on hand, and to vote for cloture, so that brings him within one vote of getting to 60. But Russ Feingold and Maria Cantwell, the two Democrats who voted against invoking cloture, are digging in. They want changes to the bill that would strengthen it, particularly around derivatives.

Cantwell’s office released a statement late today explaining her complaint.

Cantwell’s two-page amendment, co-sponsored with Blanche Lincoln, would clarify the language. It says that “any swap that is required to be cleared is unlawful unless the swap is cleared.” The current language is looser. The other part of the amendment allows regulators to stop derivatives deals if banks violated trading requirements. Basically it amounts to loophole-tightening, and the argument that it’s not important because the language is already tight makes little sense. Because if the end goal is to have language that works, what’s the problem with clarifying it?

Cantwell has a separate amendment with John McCain that would restore the Glass-Stegall firewall between investment and commercial banks, but while she said today she would prefer a vote on that amendment, “her primary concern was the derivatives issue.” The Glass-Steagall amendment seems to be the major complaint for Feingold; in his statement today, he touted his vote in 1999 against the repeal of Glass-Steagall.

It doesn’t look like Cantwell will have a shot at offering either amendment.

Aides to Mr. Reid tartly dismissed Ms. Cantwell’s concerns, saying her derivatives proposal could be added when the Senate and House regulatory bills are combined and that the proposal to restore the Glass-Steagall Act would have been defeated easily had it been called up for a vote.

It seems the game plan for Senate Democrats is just to hope Cantwell, Feingold or some Republican breaks ranks and switches on the vote. Dick Durbin said on the floor tonight that he hopes Cantwell or Feingold would “come around” tomorrow. I don’t know if that will happen. But Scott Brown (R-MA) is suggesting tonight that he did tell Harry Reid he’d be for the bill, and he may switch his vote as soon as tomorrow:

http://news.firedoglake.com/

[msongs]

1. let's all chant sell out sell out for harry nt

[BuelahWitch]

2. K&R

:kick:

[inna]

3. Wow, lots of info here. Thanks for this post, BBI. (K&R, obviously.)

[inna]

4. (self-deleted duplicate)

[chill_wind]

5. Reid's worried about his calendar - about having enough time

to get that War Supplemental for Gates he was told to get before leaving town.
And talk about unemployement benefit extensions.

How many actual work days a calendar year does Congress put in between all their breaks?
Good thing THEY don't have worry about surviving on limited unemployment benefits.

[suffragette]

6. Cantwell can be stubborn as all get out on certain issues

She stood toe-to-toe with Stevens and would not back down an inch as he threw all his tantrums about drilling.

Interesting that Reid is having to and apparently succeeding in getting Republicans to switch to vote yes in her stead.

[Better Believe It]

7. Will Senators Franken, Sanders and other join them and reject a weak bill Wall Street can support?

[suffragette]

10. I wish I knew

but from the info you posted, it doesn't look likely.
It looks to me like Republicans who support what's in the bill but wanted to cast their contrary vote will have to actually come out from behind that screen and vote for what they want to pass in the 1st place.
And again, seeing more effort to woo the Republicans than to discuss or compromise with Progressives.

[KharmaTrain]

9. It's A "Safe" Move...

I do think that Snowe & Collins will be on board for a final vote...and that I'll give Collins credit that her cloiture vote is legit, thus giving Reid the 60 to move ahead, but with Cantwell and Feingold still holding out (and I'm grateful they are), it gives some of the "moderate" rushpbulican a "safe vote" where they could vote "for" reform at this time and then get whipped into line by McChinless later to vote against the same bill they voted for.

As others have pointed out, Reid is on a time schedule here and wants to get a final vote on this bill by Friday (doubtful) so he can squeeze in other stuff before the recess. It's also a "shit or get off the pot" move as if he allows debate to keep going on the GOOP will just keep flooding bullshit ammendments and do all they can to water down the bill.

Here's hoping Senators Cantwell, Feingold, Reid and Dodd are behind closed doors to hammer things out. Yes, there needs to be stronger laws on deriviatives...and I'm a cynic to think that even the most stringent laws won't do any good as the gamblers who created this game will just create another one, but the symbolism and temporary discomfort to Wall Street will at least slow down the gambling.

[mmonk]

8. Good work. Thanks. Good for them.

[joeybee12]

11. Not a fan of Cantwell, but I think she's right here...

...the mentality of let's just pass anything is ridiculous.