FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE  
DATE: October 25, 2011

CONTACT: John Carey at 202-466-1854
john@ourfinancialsecurity.org

AFR Statement on House Judiciary Committee hearing on the Regulatory Accountability Act and markup of the REINS Act

Washington, DC – Americans for Financial Reform, a coalition of more than 250 national, state and local organizations working together for strong Wall Street reform, issued the following statement today:

Lisa Donner, Executive Director of Americans for Financial Reform:

“Irresponsible deregulation of the financial industry – and the conduct it made possible – was a root cause of the financial crisis that has cost millions of jobs and trillions of dollars in home equity and retirement savings.  The ‘Regulatory Accountability Act’  would  further stack the deck towards Wall Street special interests, and make it impossible to put in place the common sense rules we need to  demand transparency and accountability in financial markets, and prevent the financial industry from repeating the extraordinarily reckless practices for which most of us are paying so high a price.

This legislation would create numerous bureaucratic and procedural roadblocks that would prevent any action by the agencies in charge of Wall Street oversight. Among other problems, it would permit big Wall Street firms to submit – and require full evaluation of – multiple versions of their own alternatives to regulatory action, creating a de facto industry veto of any rules to protect the public interest.

Three years after the collapse of Lehman Brothers, bonuses are sky high again on Wall Street, but most Americans are struggling. Support for this legislation is support for locking in the status quo that got us here. According to recent polling data, 77 percent of Americans favor tougher rules and enforcement for big Wall Street banks and the financial services industry. A large majority also favor the recently passed Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform Act. This legislation is a backdoor attack on the ability of regulators to implement this or any new oversight, and it must be rejected.”

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