Kaptur-Jones Amendment Would Replace GOP Bill Entirely With Glass-Steagall: Get It on the Floor!
June 3, 2017
On Friday, June 2, Representatives Kaptur and Jones submitted their "Return To Prudent Banking Act" bill, HR 790, as an amendment to HR 10, the Financial Choice Act of 2017. HR 10 is the Rep. Jeb Hensarling deregulation bill to undo Dodd-Frank, and return the nation to the economic chaos and gambling policy of Alan Greenspan, Hensarling's mentor Phil Gramm and other authors of the economic disintegration of the past decades.
The Kaptur-Jones bill is not a defense of Dodd-Frank, but a simple return to Glass-Steagall. The amendment would strike the entirety of the 600-page Hensarling atrocity and replace it with Glass-Steagall. We might say "repeal and replace." The amendment likely will go before the House Rules Committee as early as this week for consideration. Because HR 10 has already passed through the Financial Services Committee and is heading to the House floor for debate and a vote, all of the amendments submitted (there are at least 15) will be considered by the Rules Committee to determine if they meet the criteria (yet to be determined) of being germane to the debate on HR 10.
The committee will likely hear testimony from Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D-OH) and possibly Rep. Walter Jones (R-NC), and engage in question and answer with the sponsors. They could vote this week, although even that is not guaranteed due to possible parliamentary maneuvering, not on the merits of the amendment. They will vote on simply whether it qualifies as germane to be taken up by the full House. The Rules Committee has 13 members. There are two current GS sponsors, Slaughter and McGovern, and a past sponsor, Hastings. The amendment sponsors suggest contacting the non GS co-sponsors urging them to vote the amendment to the floor. Again, the issue is not the merits of the amendment, but rather to insert into the debate.
Calls can be made to the Rules Committee members next week and the message is very simple: Please vote the Kaptur-Jones amendment to HR 10, in support of Glass Steagall restoration, to the floor of the House for debate and a vote. Congressional offices log amounts of phone calls. Passion is fine, but numbers are paramount. The sponsors warn: The calls should be straightforward, not contentious. The young staff taking the calls will not be engaging in debate, and do not influence voting. Here are some of the relevant numbers:
Rep Pete Sessions, TX, R, Chair——202 225 2231
Rep Tom Cole, OK, R, Vice Chair-—202-225-6165
Rep Rob Woodall, GA, R-—202 225-4272
Rep Michael Burgess, TX, R-—202 225-7772
Rep. Doug Collins, GA, R-—202 225-9893
Rep. Jared Polis, CO, D-—202 225-2161
Rep. Bradley Byrne, AL, R——202 225-4931
Rep Dan Newhouse, WA, R——202 225-5816
Rep Ken Buck, CO, R——202 225-4676
Rep. Liz Cheney, WY, R-—202 225-2311
Rep. Louise Slaughter, NY , D, Ranking Dem, and Glass Steagall Co sponsor-—202 225-3615
SUPPORTING MATERIAL
Nomi Prins Optimistic on Glass-Steagall
In a long interview with the International Business Times, banking expert and author Nomi Prins says she is optimistic on the fight for Glass-Steagall, based on her discussions on Capitol Hill. Whereas people like Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin have no intention to break up the banks, the rank and file in the Republican Party is much better, she says.
"Where I'm optimistic is that for whatever reason it got to the [Republican National Committee] RNC platform ... it's there. And obviously it's also on the Democratic platform and has been for a while. And why I'm optimistic is that I'm just personally having a lot more meetings on both sides of the aisle with a lean towards Republicans, particularly in some of the states that kind of swung over, wondering whether this is a real concern and because it's on their platform, just taking it more seriously. I'm having meetings that used to be non-existent become hour-long meetings with some of the Congress people in those states. ... And they're asking good questions.
"So that's the only reason I can be optimistic. Obviously, the bill itself has been introduced to bring back Glass-Steagall again by Elizabeth Warren and Maria Cantwell, and it's bipartisan in terms of John McCain and so forth in the Senate. There's a bill H.R.790 which is a reinstatement of Glass-Steagall which has been introduced in a bipartisan manner by [democratic] Congresswoman [marcy] Kaptur of Ohio and Congressman Walter Jones, Republican from North Carolina, that has 50 co-sponsors right now, and that's more than a similar bill had the last session around.
"There are more people in the Republican Party who are asking good questions and spending more time thinking about the matter of separating the banks, and questioning the leadership, I think in the Republican Party as to what Trump meant, and what the platform meant when the reinstatement of Glass-Steagall was put in, versus what people like Steve Mnuchin say when they say that big banks should not be broken up, that that would be a bad thing. That's not clear, within the party itself. That lack of clarity, I think, is an opportunity."
Earlier in the interview, Prins says that the corporate debt bubble today is what the subprime bubble was in 2007-08, and it is bursting.
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