Debbie Wasserman Schultz Shouldn't Be Welcoming Loan Sharks Into the Democratic Party

[fleur-de-lisa]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tim-canova/debbie-wasserman-schultz-payday-loans_b_9360186.html

by Tim Canova

We know that the most vulnerable among us were hit the hardest during the 2008 financial crisis. Millions of people lost their jobs, their homes, and their bank accounts. That's enough to make you sick to your stomach. But for many, it got worse. Predatory payday lenders stepped in to profit during the financial crisis. They targeted poor communities -- and people without access to credit from banks -- by offering them short-term loans at sky high interest rates.

On an annual basis, these companies charge late fees and rates as high as 300 to 400 percent and many companies have even charged up 1,900 percent interest on loans, which is obscene. Worse, they target people -- particularly people of color -- who are unable to pay the loan back. If they fall behind, they are offered another payday loan to help cover the cost of the prior payday loan, with fees and percentages get higher and higher, trapping them in an process that never ends.

I have pushed for regulation of payday loan companies my entire career as a law professor and political activist and I opposed the deregulation of lending standards when I served as a legislative aide to the late U.S. Senator Paul Tsongas in the 1980s. I worked with Senator Bernie Sanders and his staff on provisions in the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform Act of 2010, and I was heartened when Congress created the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) to do just that -- to provide some basic minimum standards in payday loans to prevent the poorest and most vulnerable among us from getting ripped off and trapped in a downward cycle of debt. This is a reform that has been championed by Senator Elizabeth Warren and supported by President Obama.

So why, then, is my opponent -- Debbie Wasserman Schultz -- introducing legislation in Congress to deregulate an industry that is already profiting from ripping off millions of Americans? Why is she fighting against Elizabeth Warren and the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau, who are attempting to protect our neighbors from the worst abuses by payday lenders? The answer is simple: Debbie Wasserman Schultz has been taking millions of dollars from the same corporate interests that profit from payday loans. She recently reversed President Obama's long-standing ban on corporate lobbyist donations to the Democratic National Committee (DNC), opening the door to influence peddling by the payday loan industry.

[revbones]

1. Business as usual with her and Hillary n/t

[tabasco]

2. She's awful.

Makes me want to register independent.