Ending Bailouts

Clearly, reforms are needed in our financial markets.  The American people are tired of paying for the failures of others, and real regulatory reform means that there should be no more government get out of jail free cards for bad corporate financial bets. Unfortunately, the recently enacted Dodd-Frank bill doesn’t address the root cause of the financial crisis. Instead, it stifles innovation and competition, completely ignores Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and enshrines us as a bailout nation through a permanent TARP-like bailout mechanism.

I have been opposing bailouts since the beginning of the financial crisis.  The answer to criminal greed on Wall Street is not more taxpayer bailouts, it is bankruptcy and more vigorous enforcement of our existing fraud and consumer protection laws. The fundamental truth is that the best way to prevent future taxpayer bailouts is to end taxpayer bailouts.

• I am the only Member of Congress to have introduced a legislative alternative to the TARP bailout bill during the heart of the credit crisis, which would have minimized taxpayer exposure and the politicization of the market. H.R. 7223, the Free Market Protection Act in the 110th Congress)
• I introduced legislation to end TARP, prevent the government from setting up procedural roadblocks to prevent healthy banks from repaying their TARP funds, and to ensure those repaid funds went toward deficit reduction. (H.R. 2745, the TARP Repayment and Termination Act)
• I co-authored an alternative to the Dodd-Frank permanent bailout bill that would end taxpayer-funded bailouts and “Too Big to Fail” by creating a new chapter of the Bankruptcy Code to enhance the resolution of large nonbank financial institutions.(H.R. 3310, the Consumer Protection and Regulatory Enhancement Act)