Durbin, Number Two Senate Democrat, Backs Breaking Up Banks

Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), the Senate's number two Democrat, took to the floor Tuesday to back an amendment to Wall Street reform that would break up big banks so that they are no longer too big to fail.

"I want to thank my colleagues for raising this important issue," Durbin said after a floor exchange between Sens. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) and Ted Kaufman (D-Del.). "I would say that [of] all the many amendments which will be offered, this is clearly a game changer."

"I am supportive of this amendment, even though I know that some of my friends in the banking -- some of my friends in the banking industry won't be happy with that. What they're talking about is dealing with the concentration of wealth and the concentration of economic power to a level which can literally bring the economy down. That's what we went through leading into this recession. That's what led to the massive taxpayer bailout. And that's what the Brown-Kaufman amendment addresses foursquare," Durbin said.

There has been no commitment, however, from Democratic leadership in general to give Brown-Kaufman a vote. HuffPost asked Durbin if he thought it would get a vote. "They're going to offer it. I hope it does," he said.

"I absolutely expect a vote," said Brown, though even if it does get voted on, no decision has yet been made as to whether the threshold will be 50 or 60 votes.

Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.) said that the parties were negotiating a solution and suggested that some amendments may be given a 50-vote threshold and others 60.

Comments

[Betty Perdun]

05:54 PM on 05/04/2010

Yea for Senator Durbin. Big banks should be broken up. This is the kind of boldness we need from our senators and representatives.

[Tyberius]

05:41 PM on 05/04/2010

3 types of banking operations should be mandated at separate.
(1) Commercial Banking
(2) Investment Banking
(3) Proprietary Trading

This would fix too big to fail, it would fix the current SEC investigation into Goldman, and much much more. Get (1) Commercial Banking back into boring old retail banking, loans, checking, savings. (2) investment banking to pool together large sums of money for productive capacity expansion and big business investment opportunities, and (3) Prop Trading, i.e. Hedge Funds. Keep them all separate. No need to bail out 2 and 3 if not connected to 1. No need to worry about whether Goldman is a market maker selling its crap to investors while being an investor on the short side, i.e. keeping 2 and 3 separate entities.

It's pretty easy people. Just do that, and we're on the right track. What else do you need me to fix?

[derekc06]

05:27 PM on 05/04/2010

Gotta love Sen. Durbin.. that being said though.. is he the number two or is Schumer?

[Tiffiniy Cheng]

05:04 PM on 05/04/2010

amazing -- durbin knows who owns the place.

help get more support for breaking up the banks please, we can break the stranglehold on all things important if we go after our senators now:

http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/1312/t/9845/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=1340

[WhatDaBleep]

04:52 PM on 05/04/2010

Yeah, until he's paid off!

[RoveRoveRoveYourBoat]

05:02 PM on 05/04/2010

Durbin is a straight shooter

[sansego2000]

04:47 PM on 05/04/2010

This might be the only way you will be able to eliminate bank bailouts. This too big that it can't fail is just nuts.

[samuellenn]

04:29 PM on 05/04/2010

All they are doing is distracting away from Fannie and Freddie that caused the whole mess that they were responcible for.

[RoveRoveRoveYourBoat]

05:05 PM on 05/04/2010

Dear dullard,
$900 Trillion in toxic bank generated bets and you choose to blame a few poor people?
How's the air on your planet?

[Dave Thinkster Paulson]

05:13 PM on 05/04/2010

Come on! The mess wasn't caused by Fannie and Freddie -- that assertion is the distraction, and you're perpetrating it. Fannie and Freddie accounted for only something like 17% of the sub-prime market. Their run-up had largely peaked by 2005 and most of their loans were 20-down and fixed rate. True they held around half of the loans that failed, but that was the result of the larger crash and declining home prices.

I'll certainly agree with you if you want to suggest that Fannie and Freddie are in need of reform. They should have been required to have higher levels of capital to back their loans, but to say that they caused the whole mess is simply not the truth.

[DrRoberts99]

04:28 PM on 05/04/2010

These politicians will agree with just about anything when knowing there is not a snowball's chance in hell that whatever it is will actually happen (see Public Option).

[DenverJJ]

04:24 PM on 05/04/2010

Folks what these bankers don't get is that the Kaufman vote gives those in power the greatest opportunity to control more wealth (as individuals) than any other law every made by man. Of course the new entities would all run off-shore and be completey funded with private money( from CEO bonus' and reitrement buyouts etc.) and what a great opportunity for share holders to get a piece of the IPO's necessary for the bank break-up. This multi-dimensoinal banking is abosultly necessary for the economy to grow to create jobs (from the split) and encourage competition in banking and securties operations. It's a chnace for foriegn investor funds( little guy around the world) to get their piece of America. and partner with smaller local banks in new enterprises doen to local neighborhood level... Come on bankers you got think bigger.
best,
DenverJJ

[SwingingFromCenter]

04:08 PM on 05/04/2010

For every action, there is a reaction.

Action: Senator panders for votes, claims banks should be broken up.

Reaction: Populist mob, armed with pitchforks and torches, gobbles it up because ha.ting a bank is an easy sell to said mob.

Action: Break up the banks

Reaction: US banks put at disadvantage to international counterparts such as Credit Suisse, UBS and DB, who would not be subject to the same rules imposed on the US banks. People with money all go to those banks. US seen as "host.ile" place to do business, and less international business comes this way. Financial sector put into ruins, countless jobs are lost, fragile economy as a whole goes back in the cr.apper. Extreme left somehow blames GOP and has to find another industry to claim is why it is their life su.cks (cause personal accountability has no place in Amurrikhah).

But then, I wouldn't expect the people on this site who are so far left they consider anything right of Bill Maher to be a teabagger to grasp simple economics. Just like I wouldn't expect the fringes of the right to understand the concept of "science".

[Japanese Turbo]

04:18 PM on 05/04/2010

OR, US puts these rules into play and forces other countries to follow similar laws as it usually does successfully. This is what the entire "Foreign Policy" aspect of government is all about. This will cause everyone to play on a level field.

[SwingingFromCenter]

04:23 PM on 05/04/2010

Yes, the United States is going to force other countries to change their rules to match the US's. Cause, yanno, other countries just love being told what to do by us.

[GVEric]

04:24 PM on 05/04/2010

Total B.S....the only disadvantage to banks will have is that can't stick it to the taxpayer when their ponzi scheme collapses. They can their bonuses and move to Iran for all I care.

And this isn't necessarily 100% on the GOP...more like 80%.

[SwingingFromCenter]

04:29 PM on 05/04/2010

Spoken like someone speaking out of blind emotion rather than logic and reason. Which is why your entire statement is invalid.

[Moshe]

04:04 PM on 05/04/2010

Break up the "too big to fails" and take back their illgotten gains.

A just nation rewards the people who built the nation, not the people who destroyed it.

[SwingingFromCenter]

04:30 PM on 05/04/2010

Oh look, you go a step further. I mean, the communists of the country want to break up the banks, but the fa.scists of the country want to seize their money as well. Well done, you're even more on the fringes than most.

[Moshe]

04:45 PM on 05/04/2010

I call total b.s. on your claim to the "center."

A right wing courageous defense of those that have destroyed our nation's economy.

Bravo.

Tell your children that story when they can't find jobs, houses, or food to eat.

And then check with Rush, Beck, and Hannity, and get back to us with some snappy reply sport.

[SwingingFromCenter]

04:01 PM on 05/04/2010

Should read: "Number 2 Senate Democrat complete i.diot, favours annihilating economy and losing countless jobs by breaking up banks and putting them at disadvantage to entities such as Deutsche Bank, UBS and Credit Suisse, all to pander for votes"

But I guess that headline doesn't read as well to the populist mob and their torches.

[DaveInWheaton]

04:12 PM on 05/04/2010

Your claims have been disproven time and again. Even Greenspan said the size of these institutions is a systemic risk.

Swinging from - the center of - what? GlenBeckistan? The Land Free of Facts? Repugnicant Talking point Land? Ludicrous.

[SwingingFromCenter]

04:18 PM on 05/04/2010

They've never been disproven, because they've never happened. And there's a reason why they never happened: Because anybody with half a brain knows it's just asking for trouble.

But like I said, I wouldn't expect your typical poster on this site to grasp the most basic of economic concepts. You're too busy sweating out whether that 4 dollar cup of coffee you bought this morning will put you over your limit and incur a 35 dollar overdraft fee.

[jwredd]

04:31 PM on 05/04/2010

Your argument would have a lot more weight if we hadn't just had our "economy annihilated" with "countless jobs" lost. Maybe the reaction you speak of can be caused by more than one action, no?

[DaveInWheaton]

04:01 PM on 05/04/2010

It's time to call Sen. Reid and very very strongly encourage him to bring this to a vote. Then we can see who stands with us and who stands with the banksters.

[Ben Pontiac]

03:59 PM on 05/04/2010

Breaking up the banks is a good start....imagine a true act of leadership in this sea of inane posturing to make it look like the congress is doing something. We cannot continue doing nothing and expect a different outcome!

[SwingingFromCenter]

04:01 PM on 05/04/2010

So you advocate a loss of tens of thousands, maybe even hundreds of thousands, of jobs as your plan causes the US financial sector to completely fail?

[Japanese Turbo]

04:14 PM on 05/04/2010

I don't get it, do you even think before you blurt out non sense like that. Companies merge to layoff people and reduce costs over all. When they are forced to split, they will need to maintain some degree of employment for people of the same skillsets. Jobs will actually increase. If merging kills jobs, splitting creates it. It may be at an added cost to the consumer, but it WIL increase jobs. How hard is that to understand?

[DaveInWheaton]

04:17 PM on 05/04/2010

More smaller banks will mean more jobs, not fewer. Whenever banks merge, people are made "redundant", and are therefore fired. The reverse should be also true when they are broken up.

The financial sector already completely failed, or would have if these crooks hadn't been given trillions of dollars. Did you forget about that? We didn't.

The only people helped by these institutions are themselves and the leeches on the top sucking the rest of us dry, the rest of us who work and actually produce things besides debt and thievery.

[Trittydi]

03:54 PM on 05/04/2010

Thank you Senator Durbin.

Stuff like this is what we expected when we voted for you.
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