Fed Lifts Veil of Secrecy

Calling the revelations "jaw dropping," Sen. Bernie Sanders said Wednesday's disclosure by the Federal Reserve that it gave banks and other institutions an estimated $3.3 trillion in emergency loans and other assistance during the financial crisis "begins to lift the veil of secrecy at the Fed." The estimated $3.3 trillion in liquidity and more than $9 trillion in short-term loans and other financial arrangements dwarf the $700 billion Treasury Department bank bailout out signed into law under President George W. Bush. The disclosure, available on the Fed Web site, was strenuously opposed by Chairman Ben Bernanke during a 2009 Senate Budget Committee hearing. The requirement to reveal the information was mandated by a Sanders amendment to the Wall Street reform law. The same amendment ordered the Government Accountability Office to conduct a top-to-bottom audit of the Fed. "Almost two years ago I asked Chairman Bernanke to tell the American people which financial institutions and corporations received trillions of dollars as part of the Wall Street bailout. He refused. Today, as a result of an audit-the-Fed provision I put into the financial reform bill, we finally learn the truth - and it is astounding," Sanders said. (Read his full statement here.)

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