Keith Ellison

Mr. ELLISON

Mr. ELLISON. Would the gentleman yield? May I ask the gentleman a personal question?

Mr. ELLISON. Is that what you call an information asymmetry?

Mr. ELLISON

Mr. ELLISON. Let me thank the Chair for his shepherding this critically important piece of legislation to the floor and getting us to this point. Mr. Chairman, I am very grateful that the Chair and all the members of the committee were able to include in the manager's amendment what I believe is almost the very heart of the problem here, and that is that people who qualified for certain kinds of loans were steered to loans that made certain other folks more wealthy and other people who were out to seek loans had their credit ratings mischaracterized. Sometimes people had appraisals that were false and not true, and then, of course, people who were eligible for certain loans were literally discouraged from shopping around to get a better loan. This type of steering is not ambiguous; it's not middle-of-the-road stuff. It is just wrong. And I am glad that the manager's amendment is going to direct the Secretary to promulgate rules that will put certain no-nos into the bill that would prevent steering. I think if we had not had the level of steering that we had, we would not have the number of exotic subprime loans that we had, predatory loans. And if we didn't have that, we very likely would not be at the depth of trouble that we're in right now. So I'm very happy that this is included in the manager's amendment, that we will have some clear don'ts that we will ask rules to be promulgated on, prohibiting mischaracterizing of appraisals, prohibiting discouraging shopping around, prohibiting mischaracterization of credit scores and others.

Mr. ELLISON

Mr. ELLISON. What is presentee-ism? Is it anything like absenteeism? I yield back.

Mr. ELLISON. Will the gentlelady yield for just a moment?

Mr. ELLISON. Will the gentlelady yield?

Mr. ELLISON. Well, I think what you are saying is so very important. It is part of a progressive vision for America. It is part of the idea that, hey, we all do better when we all do better. You are not a sucker or you are not a person who is gullible if you believe that it is a good idea to look out for your fellow Americans. You are a person who may be a very savvy business person because you know that by supporting the Healthy Families Act, it may cost you a little bit to give paid sick leave days for some of your low- and medium-income workers, but it will allow you to keep that dry cleaners going over the long term; it will allow you to keep your small business moving, your store, whatever it is that you may be doing, your lawn care business. You may be able to stay out there because you know you have workers who can take the day off and go get that checkup, who can take the day off and look after that child so that when they are at work, you have an alert, healthy worker. It makes so much sense. And as we began this health care debate, I noticed that one of our colleagues was doing a 5-minute speech, talking about how he is against a public plan. Well, I want to tell everybody, and I think it's important to note that when you talk about comprehensive health care reform, part of it has got to be giving low-income and medium- and moderate- workers paid sick days. Let's face it, if you are an executive, if you are at the top of the food chain economically and you are sick, you can take a day off. But what if you are a line worker, what if you are at the front desk, what if you are a low-wage worker, what if you are a minimum-wage worker? That's when you don't see many of the bennies going around. Or you could take a day off, but you're not getting paid for it. And in that case, you are forcing the worker into a terrible choice: lack of income or health. Which do you want to pick today? And that is something that people are too close to the edge to make a decision on. I yield back to the gentlelady.

Mr. ELLISON. If the gentlelady would yield.

Mr. ELLISON. I do thank the gentlelady for nailing this point. It is so important. It is part of the progressive vision that we would have an important piece of legislation that would really help Americans like the Healthy Families Act. At a time when we are concerned about illness and sickness, this kind of bill would be embraced by a progressive vision. A bill that says, hey, look, you guys, let's give 7 paid sick days to workers. This is not unusual when you compare it to what workers get in Europe, for example. It actually makes a lot of sense. You would have healthy workers, more productive workers, and as you pointed out, the gentlelady from Wisconsin, Congresswoman Moore, we would have people who go to the doctor rather than come in while they're sick. Let me just point out a few other important facts; you already hit a number of them already. But according to that University of Chicago study that you referred to, one in six workers report that they or a family member have been fired, suspended, punished, or threatened with being fired for taking time off because of personal illness or to take care of a sick relative. The lack of paid sick days is a major public health concern. As we try to prevent the spread of the H1N1 virus, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the CDC, has issued important guidelines that are sound and prudent: if you get sick, stay home; if you get sick, don't go to work or school; limit contact with other people. But how can you do this, I ask the gentlelady from the great State of Wisconsin, if it is going to cost you economically, if you are already close to the edge economically, if that job that you're on says that you don't have health insurance? You are paid by the hour, and you know that if you don't work, you don't get no money, you don't get paid. What, then, do you do if you do not have a bill like the Healthy Families Act? I think it is important that we get such legislation. I yield back to the gentlelady.

Mr. ELLISON. I just want to say that if we were to pass the Healthy Families Act, then the medium to larger businesses would provide these 7 days. Now, Big Business has a way of setting a trend for small business. So if big businesses did this, perhaps small businesses with fewer than 15 employees would say, hey, it's working for them, it's the industry standard, it makes sense, we might just do it voluntarily. I yield back to the gentlelady.

Mr. ELLISON. Well, you might end up being charged with negligence. Knowing that you're sick, knowing that you're contagious and still going to work, potentially some smart lawyer might figure out a way to sue you for negligence because you exposed them to an illness. Of course, it could be taken up by workers' compensation, but somebody's going to have to pay something somewhere. And the fact is, clearly, if you've got an on-the-job illness or injury, it would be a workers' comp claim. So the bottom line is it is something that we all need to be concerned about. I want to thank the gentlewoman from Wisconsin. As she knows, she is one of my very favorite Members of this House of Representatives, and I want to wish the gentlewoman, Gwen Moore, a Happy Mother's Day, and I also want to thank her for her very important presentation on global health for mothers. I just want to say that we have a duty and obligation to present a progressive vision for America. Which way forward? Well, the way forward is to be more inclusive, to bring more people into the warm embrace of the American people's generosity. The way forward is peace and dialogue. The way forward is to have a better America, a higher quality of life for everybody because everybody does better when everybody does better, as the late great Senator Paul Wellstone said. So, with that, it has been another progressive message, and I want to thank the gentlewoman.

Mr. ELLISON. I quite agree with the gentlelady from Wisconsin who pointed out that the Healthy Families Act is a great piece of legislation, something that is progressive, something that makes sense for America, much like legislation of the past which supported workers' rights. What this piece of legislation would do for Americans, it would allow Americans to recover from short-term illness, it would allow Americans to care for a sick family member, it would allow Americans to seek routine medical care, or to seek assistance related to domestic violence. Some people might think, ``Oh, my God, that's going to cost us a lot of money.'' If people are that sick or in serious dire straits, they're taking the time off anyway. You're not planning for it, it's not in the schedule and there's no accommodation. If somebody can come in and say, look, straight up, I've got to take the day off because I'm sick and I have 7 days I can take, then what happens is you have greater productivity because workers are taking the time off they need to get well; workers are taking their kids to get the immunizations they need; workers are now actually engaging in preventive health care which means that they are not going to have to take extended periods of time off and thereby cut productivity. By expending the money that it would take to provide the 7 sick days that are called for under the Healthy Families Act, businesses would save money. Businesses would be better off because we would have greater productivity and a healthier workforce over time. It's what my mother would call being penny wise and pound foolish to deny this legislation. But it would also be what my mother would call an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure if we were to have a great piece of legislation like the Healthy Families Act. As you pointed out, as fear of the missed and inaccurately called swine flu is going around, and it should be called the H1N1 virus--not as catchy but it's more accurate--the fact is that such legislation at this time, so people could get the flu shots and checkups that they need, in times like this would be a great idea. As you pointed out in your original 5-minute, it would help moms out, wouldn't it?

Mr. ELLISON. Congresswoman Moore, is that why it might be a good idea to support the Healthy Families Act, which is H.R. 1542, which is critical to guarantee workers up to 7 paid sick days a year? I yield to the gentlelady.

Mr. ELLISON. Well, thank you for that important statistic because we have got to count up the bill. The real difficulty in a bill like the Healthy Families Act is that we know that some people who are just looking to the next quarter, the next minute, the next moment, and if they are going to have to spend a little bit of money in the short term, they are going to say, well, that is going to cost money. Well, you know what? Not doing it is going to cost way, way, way more money. So the Healthy Families Act is a part of a progressive vision. It is just like the Wagner Act, which guaranteed workers the right to organize, just like Social Security, just like Workers' Compensation, just like a number of important programs and pieces of legislation passed in America that may have been considered liberal--or even radical at one time--but Americans have come to rely on and expect from our government. It is part of what we do as Americans together: we share. We allow in the marketplace that you can do your own thing, you are free to come up with your idea and make your money, but certain things we do together. We defend the Nation together. We defend our streets with the police together. We provide justice through our courts together. We make sure our elderly are not eating dog food through Social Security. We do this together. We make sure that people whose parents die have survivor benefits through Social Security. We build infrastructure together. And this is another thing we should do together. We should come together and say that 7 days of paid sick leave a year is a very modest request, particularly for low- and moderate-income workers. And it pays tremendous dividends down the line. If the gentlelady would allow me, I just want to share a couple of stories from my own State of Minnesota. Chrissy from Minnesota. Chrissy says, ``I am currently a stay-at-home mom''--happy Mother's Day, Chrissy--``however, prior to that I worked as a natural foods manager in a conventional grocery store for 6 years. This company offered no sick leave at all to any of its employees. Many people often work sick out of necessity.'' Chrissy, we are trying to do something about it. Amanda from Minnesota: ``I am fortunate enough to have sick time at my job at the University of Minnesota. When I was in my early 30s, I was totally healthy, exercised regularly, was at a healthy weight, and suddenly developed a rare kidney disease requiring multiple trips to multiple clinics to get multiple diagnostics. This took a lot of time away from work. Thankfully, I was able to get paid for this time. If I didn't have any income, in addition to the stress of the condition, it would have been unbearable. ``I am not so naive to believe that this is a reality of every workplace. I am very much aware of the fact that many people face struggles similar to mine on a daily basis. It is time to guarantee workers paid time to care for themselves so they are able to get their work done efficiently at no risk to themselves or their coworkers.'' Or what about the situation that Cindy is in. Cindy from Minnesota: ``I work a part-time job for a university as a researcher. In my category, sick leave is all discretionary and flexible; however, no paid vacation days accrue ever for me. The only way I feel legit in scheduling a week's vacation is if I am never sick and make up those hours pre and post.'' That's from Cindy. I offer these stories because I think it is important to point out that the Healthy Families Act is going to help Americans all over the United States. Real people are suffering because of a lack of paid sick days. This is in keeping with the protection for workers' right to organize, Social Security, workers' compensation. This is right in line with every important and progressive step Americans have made in order to improve the quality of life for your average Americans. This is like the minimum wage; this is like workers' rights; this is like civil rights; this is like women's rights. This is what we should do at this time. It is part of a progressive vision that we are going to work to make a reality for Americans. I yield back to the gentlelady.

Mr. ELLISON. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I am here to tonight to claim the time on behalf of the Progressive Caucus. The Progressive Caucus come to the floor every week to talk about a progressive vision for America, to discuss what America is and could be, to embrace the idea that everyone does better when everyone does better, to embrace the idea that we should look at the world with courage, not with fear, that we believe in dialogue, we believe in discussion. We believe in people doing well, and we believe in radical abundance, not fear of scarcity, a progressive vision; yes, even a liberal vision of an America which is doing well because everybody is working. We are promoting broad-based economic policies that allow for a higher quality of life for all Americans. Yes, the Progressive Caucus comes to the floor every week to talk to the American people and with our colleagues about these critical issues. Tonight we have a great topic, but before I announce tonight's topic, I just want to say we are very, very happy and pleased to be joined by a dynamic advocate for the cause of human justice, none other than Congresswoman Gwen Moore of the great State of Wisconsin.

Mr. ELLISON. I thank the gentlelady for yielding. Let me tell you about Leslie from Minnesota. Leslie says: ``I used to wait tables full time. And there are rare occasions where you can get paid sick days, like when I worked for a large chain hotel. However, most people don't realize that you will be paid your hourly minimum wage, but not any compensation for lost tips, which is the vast majority of your money earned as a wait person. In fact, most servers barely seek a paycheck; it is eaten up with taxes taken for declared tips--yes, you are required to declare tips. It is a myth that you can conceal this information. ``So even if you do get paid sick leave or paid vacation--which is unlikely--it is not in your interest to use it. Servers basically cannot get paid unless they are physically at work. And restaurants are such hectic places that if you are short staff, the quality of service suffers everywhere. Customers in restaurants are notoriously unsympathetic to details like this.'' Just another quick one, Kari from Minnesota: ``My kids are ages 2 and 3, and the child care center doesn't take them when they're sick. Neither my husband nor I have paid sick days. Please pass the Healthy Families Act.'' And I yield to the gentlewoman.

Mr. ELLISON

Mr. ELLISON. Let me just point out that tenants are hard hit by this foreclosure crisis even though the mortgage is not their responsibility. As of February 2009, at least 20 percent of the properties in foreclosure were rental properties, and roughly 40 percent of the families facing eviction due to foreclosure are tenants. Only seven States and the District of Columbia provide clear protection for tenants. The fact is that, if this amendment is adopted, it will add to the pain of some tenants when we don't have to do it. The 90 days in the bill is more than adequate, and 30 days is too short. We will put pressure on our homeless shelters if we adopt this amendment. We will put pressure on families who really had no part in making this foreclosure crisis occur. I thank my friend from Colorado. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. ELLISON. Mr. Chair, I thought I had the right to close.

Mr. ELLISON. Let me first thank my friend from Colorado who has worked diligently. He is an excellent legislator and was a fine lawyer and I think still is licensed to practice law, and so it is a pleasure working with him. On this issue, unfortunately, we don't quite see it the same. I think that the 90-day provision is fine and should remain in the bill as it exists now. To cut down by 60 days the opportunity for a renter to find a new place to live after they may have done nothing wrong, made every payment, paid every penny on time, really is not fair and is not good for public policy. The fact is that, when a house goes into foreclosure, that neighborhood and that home are best preserved by keeping that occupant in there. If they are required to leave just after 30 days, which is very, very fast, that means that we could end up with an empty building where it is subject to copper strippers. It will be an attractive nuisance for people who want to commit, perhaps, crime. It will be a very difficult and bad situation. And we know that once a house goes into foreclosure and then is not occupied, that is a direct blow to the property values of people who live everywhere in the neighborhood. So this provision, this 90 days actually makes a lot of sense. It should stay in harmony with the bill as it exists and not be reduced. I will acknowledge appreciation that the author of this amendment does allow for 30 days. I appreciate that, but I think it should be more. It should be the 90 days that is already there. This amendment, if adopted, would work to penalize the one person who has not had anything to do with the foreclosure crisis. They were not party to the foreclosure. They were not party to the mortgage in the beginning. They weren't party to the securitization, nor did they engage in any derivatives or anything like that which have brought us to this very difficult point. The fact is that the tenant who may have been paying every rent every month, month after month, has no control or responsibility over the owner who may have violated certain conditions of the mortgage agreement, and this extra 60 days that the existing bill provides is not a major detriment to the lender. Let me just also say, the fact is this is not just an individual problem. To take a very legalistic view of this problem and say they are not in the chain of title, therefore, they are out, ignores the fact that this problem of foreclosures has spread across the Nation, is a community problem, is a problem of everyone, not just a narrow, fixed party-to-party agreement. Therefore, there needs to be a solution that takes into consideration the broader interests as well. Again, I thank the gentleman from Colorado for his diligent work on this issue. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. ELLISON. Mr. Chairman, I rise to claim the time in opposition.

Mr. ELLISON

Mr. ELLISON. Congressman and Mr. Speaker, let me just point out for our listeners that, today, about 30 percent of all homeowners are underwater. About 30 percent are underwater. That means that the value of their home is lower than the debt owed on their home. This is a very serious and catastrophic situation and obviously causing a tremendous amount of angst, consternation, fear, and frustration among people across our country. Obviously, when your house is underwater, it might be easier for you to just leave the keys and walk away. We urge people to try to work things out with their lending institution. But there's no doubting that the American Congress must be attune to the tremendous pain, difficulty, and frustration people are facing. When people are suffering from frustration, sometimes what they need is people who are in leadership to help clarify what is really going on as opposed to people in leadership confusing what is really going on. Confusing the issue is a very dangerous thing to do. I would submit to you that America that has done so much to overcome racial division and may be one of the only countries in the world to go from a slaveholding society to a society where a person who, based on color, would have been a slave himself but is now President, a person who would have been denied a cup of coffee 50 years before he became sworn in to be President, is President. This is a tremendous thing and a great thing for America. The credit goes to people of all colors: black, white, red, yellow, brown, everybody. But at times like this, it's important to also not allow the racial progress America has made to slip back by allowing some people to use code language and say that people of color, poor whites, are responsible for the problem. When people are frustrated, they need answers. When they need answers, they need clarity, not confusion from leaders, not fear- mongering tactics assigning blame that is not there. And I would submit to you that all of us, people of all colors, need to stand together to clarify what is really going on with the CRA because, in my opinion, people who say that the CRA is to blame, Fannie and Freddie are only to blame--of course, they do have some fault on them, but they are not, by any stretch of the imagination, the only one. I think it is very important that we say together as a unified racial community that we will not allow racial stereotyping as it relates to what caused this housing crisis. In my opinion, saying that it's because of the CRA, knowing that the CRA was designed to promote racial harmony and opportunity, is a way of blaming people of color for the financial crisis. Now we can debate this issue, but I guarantee you, if you were to say, ``What does the CRA do?'' and you say, ``It was in response to redlining, that's why it was passed,'' so the question you might ask, ``Well, you mean so it was to try to stop racism or antidiscrimination?'' And the answer would have to be yes, that is what it is for.

Mr. ELLISON. Mr. Speaker, what else are these purveyors of confusion supposed to say? They have had an opportunity to spread deregulation all over. They have declined the opportunity for many years to pass an antipredatory lending bill. They have promoted tax breaks for the wealthiest among us. And now that they have had the opportunity to have a House and a Senate in which their particular caucus was in the majority, they have had a full opportunity to manifest their economic ideas, and what those ideas have come to has been the largest foreclosure crisis since the Great Depression. What these economic ideas that the poor have too much and the rich don't have enough is that we have had serious unemployment spikes higher than any that we have seen since the early eighties, which was the Reagan recession. What we have seen is record lows in consumer confidence. The fact is you can't expect the people who are purveying confusion regarding the CRA to come clean because then they would have to admit that it is their economic policies that have brought forth the economic malaise that America is in now. In fact, the Community Reinvestment Act is good economics. The Community Reinvestment Act says that what we are going to do is we are going to ask banks who draw deposits from neighborhoods to also loan to that neighborhood. The Community Reinvestment Act came about based on statistically documentable evidence of red-lining, which is a process whereby lenders and sometimes insurance companies systematically denied credit to certain communities, particularly low-income and minority communities. Importantly, the Community Reinvestment Act does not prescribe minimum targets nor dictate specific underwriting policies. It doesn't even set goals for lending or investment. Instead, it gives considerable discretion to bank regulators and examiners, and ensures that loans are made in a manner consistent, as you pointed out, Congressman Cleaver, with safe and sound banking practices. Let me just quote from somebody who ought to know a little bit about banking and the financial markets, and that is Fed Governor Elizabeth Duke. Fed Governor Elizabeth Duke is a person with a Ph.D. in economics who studied these issues, is not known for wild statements, and is essentially a paragon of reliability and stability. Here is her analysis. She says that the claim that the CRA, the Community Reinvestment Act, caused the current crisis is a ``misperception promulgated by many who either do not know much about the law or don't like it.'' That's what Fed Governor Elizabeth Duke had to say. Finally, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke has indicated, ``Our own experience with the CRA over more than 30 years and recent analysis of available data, including data on subprime loan performance, runs counter to the charge that the CRA was at the root of or otherwise contributed to in any substantive way the current mortgage difficulties.'' So I have more to say, Congressman Cleaver, but let me share the mic with others who have much more to say as well. Thank you.

Mr. ELLISON. Certainly. And I just want to raise this issue, if either gentleman would care to comment. While it is obviously true that the CRA did not cause this financial crisis, I hope you don't fault me too much for straying away and talking about what I think did cause the crisis. And what I think caused the crisis, clearly, when you have a mortgage originator--and many mortgage originators are good, and I thank the gentleman for pointing out that we are not here to indict an entire industry. But we are saying that the bad actors, there was no cop on the beat here for the people who would transgress. That when mortgage originators were given additional money in order to steer a homebuyer who was seeking a mortgage to a higher priced loan, that is the kind of thing that would get people into a whole lot of trouble, particularly when that same mortgage originator would say, ``Oh, we'll just do stated income.'' ``Oh, you don't have to verify income.'' ``We're just going to underwrite your mortgage during the teaser rate period and not during the entire length of the loan.'' These are the kind of things that got people in trouble. There is one of our colleagues that is fond of saying: Oh, predatory lending, predatory lending. What about predatory borrowing? Have you heard this term before? Well, predatory borrowing, what happened is that people would get a financial incentive to steer you away from that lower interest rate loan to that higher interest rate loan and keep the cream, yield spread premium. This is what got people steered to the higher priced loans. So that is part of the problem. The next part of the problem is that when those mortgage originators did that loan, they could sell it on the secondary market where it was almost never scrutinized as whether it was a good loan or bad, that it would just be sucked up and it would be packaged up into a mortgage- backed security. And those mortgage-backed securities would be packaged up into collateralized debt obligations. And some of these loans that were nonperforming, and there were large numbers of them, people would go out and buy insurance or, quote-unquote, insurance on these securities, but they were never required with these swaps to have enough money to cover if in fact the value of the security went down. So when they started going down and people said ``pay me,'' the companies that wrote these swap agreements weren't able to cover; and when they couldn't cover, then some of them started going under.

Mr. ELLISON. So it sounds like, according to Mr. Greenspan, that he is saying that it was this excessive demand for collateralized debt obligations, for the credit default swaps, which a lot of people would take on more risk than they were able to really absorb. These things really accelerated the financial crisis, according to the experts. Is that right?

Mr. ELLISON. I will certainly yield to the gentleman from Texas, Congressman Al Green, who is a stalwart advocate of consumers, investors, and all Americans.