USAToday: Financial Sector Ups Lobbying Effort Over New Regulation Plan

Americans for Financial Reform was mentioned in this USAToday article.  Here is an excerpt:

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has spent $2 million on advertising, including commercials slamming the creation of a federal consumer-protection agency, and plans to spend more, said David Hirschmann, CEO of the chamber’s Center for Capital Markets Competitiveness. Bankers around the country, meanwhile, have sent about 250,000 letters to Congress raising alarms at the behest of the American Bankers Association, said Edward Yingling, the group’s president. The association issued a “call to action” to its members recently, urging bankers to reach out “early and often” to senators who are expected to take up the legislation early next year.

On the other side, Americans for Financial Reform, a coalition of labor and civil rights groups formed in June, has spent nearly $2 million pushing for tougher regulation of the financial sector, Executive Director Heather Booth said.

“This bill is a sea change … in the way the financial services industry is regulated,” said Scott Talbott, senior vice president of the Financial Services Roundtable, the lobbying arm for Wall Street banks. “It’s all hands on deck.”

The financial services sector is among the biggest lobbying interests, outpacing, for instance, what labor unions and defense firms each spent during the first nine months of this year.

Read the full article.