[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 162 (2016), Part 5]
[Senate]
[Pages 6803-6804]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                     LABOR DEPARTMENT PENSION RULE

  Ms. WARREN. Madam President, 8 years ago reckless bankers on Wall 
Street sparked a financial meltdown. Their too-big-to-fail banks 
gambled with our economy, encouraging reckless mortgage lending by 
funding the slimy subprime lenders who peddled their miserable products 
to millions of American families. Those same banks then gobbled up 
those dangerous mortgages, repackaged them, and spread huge risks 
throughout the financial system.
  The consequences were disastrous. Wall Street greed destroyed $7 
trillion in housing wealth and resulted in millions of Americans losing 
their homes. It killed 8.7 million American jobs. It gutted hundreds of 
pension funds, leaving millions of retirees hung out to dry.
  Thanks to Washington bailouts, Wall Street is once again flying high. 
Corporate profits are up, and the stock market is soaring. But the real 
people who were hurt by the financial collapse--the millions of workers 
who lost their jobs, lost their homes, and lost their retirement 
savings because of Wall Street's reckless greed--many of them haven't 
bounced back. The evidence of this is everywhere, but consider just one 
recent example. Earlier this month, 400,000 participants in the Central 
States Pension Fund narrowly escaped having their hard-earned pension 
benefits slashed by as much as 70 percent. Their benefits were on the 
chopping block because that fund is in terrible trouble. There are a 
lot of reasons why, but one reason is beyond dispute: Wall Street 
greed.
  The story is ugly. In the runup to the financial collapse, Goldman 
Sachs and Northern Trust were in charge of managing the Central States 
Pension Fund and making its investment decisions. Instead of doing what 
was best for workers and retirees, these financial giants invested 
those retirement savings in junk bonds and mortgage bonds issued by 
firms whose names today would fill a Wall Street Hall of Shame: Bear 
Stearns, Countrywide, IndyMac, and Lehman Brothers.
  The crash of 2008 hit the Central States Pension Fund like a shiv in 
the ribs. In 15 months in 2008 and early 2009, pension assets managed 
by Goldman Sachs and Northern Trust dropped

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by 42 percent. That is more than twice the losses suffered by other 
multi-employer pension funds. And to add salt to the wound--the part 
that really twists the knife here--from 2005 to 2009, Goldman Sachs and 
Northern Trust charged Central States $41 million for the privilege of 
managing and wrecking their retirement fund.
  Last month the Treasury Department rejected pension cuts to the 
Central States Pension Fund for the short term and bought these 
retirees some time. But this story isn't over. Unless the Senate acts, 
this pension plan will collapse within 10 years. Unless the Senate 
acts, hundreds of thousands of retirees whose pensions are currently on 
life support will lose those pensions entirely.
  Tomorrow the Republicans, who control the Senate, are ready to act. 
Tomorrow they will bring a pension bill to the floor. Is it a bill to 
help save the 400,000 men and women of the Central States Pension Fund 
whose futures were decimated through no fault of their own? On that 
topic, the Republicans have nothing to say. Instead, the Republicans 
are bringing up a bill to make it easier--easier--for giant Wall Street 
financial institutions to cheat Americans out of their retirement 
savings.
  The Senate will be voting to make it easier for shady financial 
institutions and unscrupulous financial advisers to mislead investors 
about the quality of the investments so those advisers can continue 
pushing lousy products, just like the junk bonds and mortgage funds 
that tanked the Central States pension plan. The Senate will be voting 
on whether to overturn the commonsense regulations the Department of 
Labor completed last month to protect Americans' hard-earned retirement 
savings from slick-talking advisers who push complicated products that 
give great payoffs to the advisers and terrible results for their 
customers.
  Here is the problem: Because of loopholes in the law, it has long 
been perfectly legal for investment advisers to push products that 
drain away customer savings while they generate high fees, free 
vacations, cars, bonuses, and kickbacks for the advisers. These 
conflicts cost American families an estimated $17 billion every year. 
The new commonsense rule would put a stop to these practices. It is a 
pretty simple rule. It would ensure that financial advisers have to 
recommend products that are in the customers' best interests. No more 
pushing products just to generate high fees and payments for the 
advisers. No more free vacations. No more kickbacks. Why would anyone 
on Earth vote to overturn a rule designed to protect Americans from 
financial fraud? Why? Because it is an election year, so Senators and 
Congressmen have their hands out, willing to take every dime of Wall 
Street money they can get. Killing this new rule will cost American 
families $17 billion a year in lost retirement savings, but it will 
sure help to fill up the campaign accounts of the Republican Senators 
who vote for it. In the meantime, the clock keeps ticking for hundreds 
of thousands of Central States retirees, and the Republicans refuse to 
do anything.
  The Republicans who control the Senate may think that tomorrow's vote 
will help their fundraising efforts. Even so, I will be voting no 
because we weren't sent here just to raise money for reelections. We 
weren't sent here to make money for Wall Street and their armies of 
lobbyists and lawyers. We weren't sent here to reward the too-big-to-
fail banks that tanked our economy and then got billions of dollars in 
bailouts. We weren't sent here to make it easier for financial 
institutions to cheat people. The Republicans who run the Senate seem 
to have forgotten that. If they don't remember it soon, you can bet the 
American people will remind them in November.
  Thank you, Madam President.
  I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. CORNYN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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