Controversial Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., whom President Donald Trump often refers to as “Crazy Maxine” and “Low-IQ Maxine” is primed to become the next chair of the powerful Financial Services Committee, which could be bad news for big banks, investment houses and insurance companies.
Waters, or “Mad Maxine” as she is known on Capitol Hill, has long pined for the chance to scrutinize Trump’s finances, including his ties to Deutsche Bank AG.
Per a recent interview with Bloomberg:
Earlier this week, Waters told Bloomberg Television that Deutsche Bank’s lending to Trump is likely to be a focus of scrutiny for Democrats now that they are set to take control of the House in January, gaining power to launch investigations. Federal law requires financial institutions to file reports on a broad range of potentially suspicious activities, such as payments of more than $10,000 or involving government officials. The filings are confidential and don’t necessarily indicate wrongdoing.
Aside from Trump and with Waters likely chairing the Financial Services Committee, a recent Washington Times article by Stephen Moore points out that amounts to asking the fox to guard the hen house.
Moore recants an appearance with Waters on HBO’s “Real Time With Bill Maher,” where he called her out for taking campaign contributions from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac before the housing bubble blew up in 2008, which she denied. After some fact checking, she did in fact take $15,000 from the Fannie PAC.
Per the Washington Times:
I was also right about her statements during a 2004 congressional hearing when she said:
“Through nearly a dozen hearings, we were frankly trying to fix something (Fannie and Freddie) that wasn’t broke. Mr. Chairman, we do not have a crisis at Freddie Mac, and particularly at Fannie Mae, under the outstanding leadership of Franklin Raines.”
We learned the hard way just four years later; this was all a fraudulent claim to avoid oversight of her campaign contributors, and imagine if a Republican had said these things.
Moore goes on to say that Waters has taken more than $100,000 in perfectly legal donations from Wall Street this year, calling into question her ulterior motive and “shakedown tactics.”
First, she threatens to put their head in a noose as chairman of the Financial Services Committee, as she is getting them to pony up campaign contributions. Pay to play? You decide.
Maxine Waters has had run-ins with the House Ethics Committee because of fund-raising tactics and insider wheeling and dealing. Back during the financial crisis, she was suspected of helping to arrange meetings with Treasury Department officials and getting bailout money for OneUnited, a troubled bank that her family owned major stock holdings in. She beat the wrap of corruption, but it sure smelled bad.
So will she be the crusading financial protector of our 401k plans and save America from the next financial bubble? Well there will certainly be lots of harassment and shakedowns. But don’t count on her steering us clear of Wall Street excesses. If history is any guide, Mad Maxine will be way too busy raising money from the people she is now in charge of regulating.