Obama Weekly Address Slams Banks For Selfishness: ‘It’s A Sight To See’ (VIDEO)
First Posted: 01-16-10 08:05 AM | Updated: 01-16-10 09:42 AM
DARLENE SUPERVILLE, Associated Press
WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama on Saturday pitched his proposed tax on banks to recover the cost of bailing them out during the financial crisis, saying if they can afford billions more in bonuses, they can pay back the taxpayers, too.
The banks and Republican lawmakers oppose the tax, which Obama announced this week.
“We’re going to pass this fee into law,” the president said in his weekly radio and Internet address.
Congress must approve the tax and that was not assured, given the immediate opposition from Republicans. Democrats also appeared in jeopardy of losing their 60-vote majority in the Senate, with Democrat Martha Coakley in an unexpectedly close race against Republican Scott Brown in Massachusetts to fill the seat held for decades by the late Democrat Edward M. Kennedy.
Brown opposes Obama’s bank tax. Obama was heading to Massachusetts on Sunday to campaign for Coakley.
The White House’s decision to use the weekly address to speak about the proposed tax instead of the U.S. response to the suffering and devastation caused by the earthquake in Haiti suggested one line of attack Obama would use against Brown on Sunday.
Leave a comment