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The truth about Hillary's handling of the bankruptcy bill
Found this on reddit. Thought it was quite interesting.
What about that viral Elizabeth Warren video about Hillary Clinton and this infamous bankruptcy bill?
I've seen almost every Bernie supporter on social media share this Bill Moyers interview of progressive darling, Elizabeth Warren, seemingly criticizing Hillary Clinton for "flip-flopping" on the bankruptcy bill. This interview is constantly referenced as a prime example of Hillary Clinton's lack of character as someone who "flip-flops" on issues and as proof she is bought by corporate Wall Street-- but the reality is much more complicated and nuanced and couldn't be any farther from those false accusations of impropriety. Warren is a darling of the left, and so I think a lot of people take her word as gospel without subjecting her words to any scrutiny. This clip of Elizabeth Warren is powerful and shocking, and as a Clinton supporter, at first viewing, it almost made me jump ship in prompt and necessary support of Bernie Sanders.
The fact is: this video clip is highly disingenuous and at face value, pure misinformation... I'm going to walk you through on how exactly it is deceitful and what really happened.
If you haven't watched the video yet, watch it. It will elicit a visceral reaction within you -- albeit one not favorable of Clinton, one that could easily fuel a ~berning~ rage against her. But then immediately read below to gain insight as to what really happened.
Here is the order of events:
1. Firstly, as Warren notes in the interview, Hillary took Warren's advice and directly encouraged President Clinton to veto the bankruptcy legislation. Warren remarks: "[Mrs. Clinton] turned around a whole administration on the subject of bankruptcy." In the final years of the Clinton administration, congress voted to send the bankruptcy bill to the president with 70 votes. Once it arrived, Bill vetoed it at Hillary's direct insistence and the session of congress ended before they could take it up again. With 70 votes it was pretty likely that they could have overridden the veto if they had been given the chance but this was very late into his second term, in fact the last bill that ever made it to President Clinton's desk and Congress did not have enough time to override it.
2. After Hillary was elected to the Senate (and the Dems gained more seats), she leveraged her influence to make some amendments to the bankruptcy law when it came up again in the 107th session of congress. These amendments addressed several of Warren's principal concerns, like helping women collect child support payments and closing loopholes for the wealthy.
This is where context is key. It is important to note that this bankruptcy bill had tremendous and overwhelming bipartisan support: it passed in the Senate with 83 votes. In this session, Hillary made a tactical choice that she couldn’t stop the bill but that she could use the democratic support it had to pass the aforementioned amendments to improve it. It was strategic and all that she could do. She voted for the version of the bill that contained various amendments Hillary claims that Democratic leadership (namely Joe Biden) told her that she needed to vote for the final bill for her special amendments to be included. In a speech on the floor, Hillary said:
"Many of my colleagues may remember that I was a strong critic of the bill that passed out of the 106th Congress. While we have yet to achieve the kind of bankruptcy reform I believe is possible, I have worked with a number of people to make improvements that bring us closer to our goals ... Let me be very clear—I will not vote for final passage of this bill if it comes back from conference if [my] reforms are missing. I am voting for this legislation because it is a work in progress, and it is making progress towards reform."
This version of the bill was never able to be reconciled with the House because the Senate version included a provision from Chuck Schumer that made debts from legal proceedings involving anti-abortion terrorism non-dischargeable and so the bankruptcy bill died on the vine [6]. This is the vote that Warren is referring to. Furthermore, Clinton later said that she regretted voting for this version of the bill (which was the most liberal form it ever took).
3.After the 2004 elections republicans gained the majority of seats in the senate which basically ensured this vampire of a bill would eventually be passed. The Senate Republicans again took up the bankruptcy bill, but this time without Clinton's amendments and the Democrats' provisions. The Democrats tried to block its passage (Clinton voted to maintain a filibuster of it), but the Republicans enlisted enough Democratic votes to break it and pass the law. Clinton did not vote on the final version because she was with Bill while he was undergoing a heart bypass. The bill eventually passed 74-25 and Hillary's vote or presence would not have changed the situation. Nevertheless, she returned to the Senate the following day and gave a speech condemning the bill [7].
4.Finally, let's note that in 2013 Elizabeth Warren personally urged Hillary Clinton to run for president [3]. So people who suggest Elizabeth Warren is not for Hillary Clinton aren't telling the truth.
TL;DR: In the video clip, Warren is either oversimplifying or purposefully misrepresenting Hillary's role in the story. The only time Hillary voted for the bill was a version that included provisions to make it less bad. She was instrumental to blocking the Republicans' first version, and she voted against the version that finally passed.
Sources:
(1) http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d106:HR02415:@@@L&summ2=m&
(2) https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/107-2001/s36
(3) http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2013/10/in-secret-letter-senate-democratic-women-rally-behind-hillary-clinton/
(4) https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/109-2005/s44
(5) https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/107-2001/s36
(6) http://www.nytimes.com/2002/05/23/us/abortion-debate-stalls-bankruptcy-bill.html
(7) http://m.dailykos.com/story/2015/9/22/1423815/-Something-I-Heard-About-Hillary-Clinton-is-Untrue-The-Bankruptcy-Bill-Edition
(8)
My personal thoughts on what happened: This story demonstrates that even in the face of overwhelming defeat, Hillary Clinton's acumen for political strategy and shrewdness in legislating allowed her to extract progress and results out of the grimmest of congressional circumstances. When Hillary says, "I'm a progressive that likes to get things done" she means it, she's lived it, and it is proclamation that is wholly authentic and unequivocally true.
I've seen almost every Bernie supporter on social media share this Bill Moyers interview of progressive darling, Elizabeth Warren, seemingly criticizing Hillary Clinton for "flip-flopping" on the bankruptcy bill. This interview is constantly referenced as a prime example of Hillary Clinton's lack of character as someone who "flip-flops" on issues and as proof she is bought by corporate Wall Street-- but the reality is much more complicated and nuanced and couldn't be any farther from those false accusations of impropriety. Warren is a darling of the left, and so I think a lot of people take her word as gospel without subjecting her words to any scrutiny. This clip of Elizabeth Warren is powerful and shocking, and as a Clinton supporter, at first viewing, it almost made me jump ship in prompt and necessary support of Bernie Sanders.
The fact is: this video clip is highly disingenuous and at face value, pure misinformation... I'm going to walk you through on how exactly it is deceitful and what really happened.
If you haven't watched the video yet, watch it. It will elicit a visceral reaction within you -- albeit one not favorable of Clinton, one that could easily fuel a ~berning~ rage against her. But then immediately read below to gain insight as to what really happened.
Here is the order of events:
1. Firstly, as Warren notes in the interview, Hillary took Warren's advice and directly encouraged President Clinton to veto the bankruptcy legislation. Warren remarks: "[Mrs. Clinton] turned around a whole administration on the subject of bankruptcy." In the final years of the Clinton administration, congress voted to send the bankruptcy bill to the president with 70 votes. Once it arrived, Bill vetoed it at Hillary's direct insistence and the session of congress ended before they could take it up again. With 70 votes it was pretty likely that they could have overridden the veto if they had been given the chance but this was very late into his second term, in fact the last bill that ever made it to President Clinton's desk and Congress did not have enough time to override it.
2. After Hillary was elected to the Senate (and the Dems gained more seats), she leveraged her influence to make some amendments to the bankruptcy law when it came up again in the 107th session of congress. These amendments addressed several of Warren's principal concerns, like helping women collect child support payments and closing loopholes for the wealthy.
This is where context is key. It is important to note that this bankruptcy bill had tremendous and overwhelming bipartisan support: it passed in the Senate with 83 votes. In this session, Hillary made a tactical choice that she couldn’t stop the bill but that she could use the democratic support it had to pass the aforementioned amendments to improve it. It was strategic and all that she could do. She voted for the version of the bill that contained various amendments Hillary claims that Democratic leadership (namely Joe Biden) told her that she needed to vote for the final bill for her special amendments to be included. In a speech on the floor, Hillary said:
"Many of my colleagues may remember that I was a strong critic of the bill that passed out of the 106th Congress. While we have yet to achieve the kind of bankruptcy reform I believe is possible, I have worked with a number of people to make improvements that bring us closer to our goals ... Let me be very clear—I will not vote for final passage of this bill if it comes back from conference if [my] reforms are missing. I am voting for this legislation because it is a work in progress, and it is making progress towards reform."
This version of the bill was never able to be reconciled with the House because the Senate version included a provision from Chuck Schumer that made debts from legal proceedings involving anti-abortion terrorism non-dischargeable and so the bankruptcy bill died on the vine [6]. This is the vote that Warren is referring to. Furthermore, Clinton later said that she regretted voting for this version of the bill (which was the most liberal form it ever took).
3.After the 2004 elections republicans gained the majority of seats in the senate which basically ensured this vampire of a bill would eventually be passed. The Senate Republicans again took up the bankruptcy bill, but this time without Clinton's amendments and the Democrats' provisions. The Democrats tried to block its passage (Clinton voted to maintain a filibuster of it), but the Republicans enlisted enough Democratic votes to break it and pass the law. Clinton did not vote on the final version because she was with Bill while he was undergoing a heart bypass. The bill eventually passed 74-25 and Hillary's vote or presence would not have changed the situation. Nevertheless, she returned to the Senate the following day and gave a speech condemning the bill [7].
4.Finally, let's note that in 2013 Elizabeth Warren personally urged Hillary Clinton to run for president [3]. So people who suggest Elizabeth Warren is not for Hillary Clinton aren't telling the truth.
TL;DR: In the video clip, Warren is either oversimplifying or purposefully misrepresenting Hillary's role in the story. The only time Hillary voted for the bill was a version that included provisions to make it less bad. She was instrumental to blocking the Republicans' first version, and she voted against the version that finally passed.
Sources:
(1) http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d106:HR02415:@@@L&summ2=m&
(2) https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/107-2001/s36
(3) http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2013/10/in-secret-letter-senate-democratic-women-rally-behind-hillary-clinton/
(4) https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/109-2005/s44
(5) https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/107-2001/s36
(6) http://www.nytimes.com/2002/05/23/us/abortion-debate-stalls-bankruptcy-bill.html
(7) http://m.dailykos.com/story/2015/9/22/1423815/-Something-I-Heard-About-Hillary-Clinton-is-Untrue-The-Bankruptcy-Bill-Edition
(8)
My personal thoughts on what happened: This story demonstrates that even in the face of overwhelming defeat, Hillary Clinton's acumen for political strategy and shrewdness in legislating allowed her to extract progress and results out of the grimmest of congressional circumstances. When Hillary says, "I'm a progressive that likes to get things done" she means it, she's lived it, and it is proclamation that is wholly authentic and unequivocally true.
6 replies
= new reply since forum marked as read
= new reply since forum marked as read
People are too often given a short-form version and never bother to do any checking to see if there is more to the story--especially if it serves as confirmation bias.
