TPMDC Gregory Meeks
Financial Reform
Behind Closed Doors Four Key Democrats Maneuver To Weaken Financial Reform
Brian Beutler | June 17, 2010, 11:48AM
(Clockwise from top left) Reps. Dennis Moore (D-KS), Gregory Meeks (D-NY), Luis Gutierrez (D-IL), Mel Watt (D-NC)
Several House Democrats with close ties to the financial industry, including four members of the conference committee hashing out the final bill, are pushing to weaken the Wall Street reform legislation in the conference committee.
The 68-member New Democrat Coalition has been circulating drafts of a letter outlining their position on financial regulatory reform, proposing to significantly scale back regulations on derivative trading, and open up exceptions to the so-called Volcker rule, which limits financial firms' ability to speculate with their profits.
One draft of that letter, obtained by TPM, can be read here. Their position on derivatives provoked the ire of Americans for Financial Reform, the largest pro-regulation coalition in the country, which responded yesterday with a letter of their own.
PERMALINK | COMMENTS (20) | RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (0)Topics: Bear Sterns, Dennis Moore, Derivatives , Financial Reform, Gregory Meeks, Luis Gutierrez, Mel Watt, Paul Volcker, Scott Brown, Volcker Rule, Wall Street
David Paterson
Meeks: I Didn't Really Tell Paterson Not To Run -- I Communicated "Issues" To Him
Eric Kleefeld | September 22, 2009, 1:18PM
A big story this week has been the report that President Obama, through the intermediary of Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-NY), asked Gov. David Paterson (D-NY) to not run for re-election in light of his bad poll numbers and the potential danger to the Dem ticket in a big state.
Meeks appeared today on Bloomberg TV and soft-pedaled what happened -- saying that he didn't directly ask Paterson not to run. Meeks said something should be corrected: "And that is that the administration never said, 'Go tell Gov. Paterson he should step down, he should not run for re-election,' or anything of that nature."
"The administration had indicated that they had some troubles -- you know, looking at what the solution is, and we're getting close to 2010, and they wanted to make sure that we go into 2010 as strong as possible," Meeks explained. "And so there were some issues, and so basically I was just telling the governor, that there are some issues that the administration has, and that he needs to try to talk to some folks in the administration, and see if they can be resolved."
PERMALINK | COMMENTS (9) | RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (1)Topics: Barack Obama, David Paterson, Gregory Meeks, NY-GOV
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