Sanders continued, “While Wall Street received the largest taxpayer bailout in the history of the world with no strings attached, the American middle class continues to disappear, poverty is increasing and the gap between the very rich and everyone else is growing wider and wider”.
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“To those on Wall Street who may be listening today, let me be very clear: Greed is not good”, said Sanders, in a reference to Oliver Stone’s 1980s film, “Wall Street“.
In California, a late-voting state, Clinton holds the support of 46 percent of likely Democratic primary voters.
Is Wall Street beginning to “feel the Bern” yet?
Since 1977, the Fed has been mandated by Congress to pursue a “dual mandate” of maximum employment and low inflation, but Fed officials are often criticized for pursuing one at the expense of the other.
“You can also count on me to stand my ground especially when it comes to those powerful interests that are holding back American families”, Clinton said.
“I think what you have is a situation where banks are not only too big to fail, bankers are too big to jail”, he added.
Clinton’s campaign tried to pre-empt Sanders speech on Monday afternoon, putting out a statement from a top aide arguing that Clinton’s financial regulation proposals would do more to crack down on industry abuses. Clinton argues that regulators should focus on “shadow banks” instead of the big banks targeted by Glass-Steagall. Both Sanders and Warren are pushing for a return of the Glass-Steagall Act, a now-repealed law that created a firewall between traditional and investment banking.
Clinton still maintains a commanding lead in the polls, but signs are emerging that she may not be in as strong a position in the state as she would like. At the December 19 Democratic debate, Clinton was asked whether corporate America should love her. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt. (right) are greeted by Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid in Las Vegas.
If there’s one issue in the Democratic presidential primary on which Bernie Sanders’s advantage over Hillary Clinton should be clear-cut, it is Wall Street reform.
“We continue to believe Clinton would be one of the better candidates for financial firms, as she is pushing concrete reforms where one can understand the downside risk rather than more radical overhauls”, Guggenheim Partners analyst Jaret Seiberg wrote in an October note to clients analyzing Clinton’s plan.
Copyright 2016 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.
The third major Democratic candidate, former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley, has trailed Clinton and Sanders by a wide margin but won cheers from the crowd with a series of slams against the Republican presidential field. Speaking in New York, Sanders repeated his calls to break up the nation’s biggest banks, and he had some tough words for the Federal Reserve. “I’m not really into politics and a political person… but when I hear her speak, I’m able to understand it”.
“While it makes for great political theater, there is zero chance of breaking up the large banks”, Greg McBride, chief financial analyst at Bankrate.com, said.
“Absolutely not, no we are in this until the end”, Sanders replied.
Photo Democratic presidential candidate Sen.
The most ambitious aspects of Sanders’ plan to take on Wall Street could not be achieved through an executive order.
Clinton made the same case on her behalf, saying that “in January of 2017, a new president is going to walk into the Oval Office and America can’t afford it to be a Republican who will rip away all the progress we have made”.
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JANICE WRIGHT: You know, you look at him, you think grandfather. And he means what he says, and he’ll follow through.
