Could Barney Frank lose to former Marine Sean Bielat. Ask Kennedy's ghost, or Scott Brown's daughter. The 15-term Congressman is getting nervous.
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From the Boston Herald:
Despite vow, Barney Frank rakes in $40G from bailed out banks
U.S. Rep. Barney Frank, in an intensifying clash with GOP upstart Sean Bielat, has pledged not to take campaign cash from lenders that got federal bailouts — yet has raked in more than $40,000 from bank execs and special interests connected to the staggering government loans, a Herald review found.
Frank vowed in February 2009 that he wouldn’t accept campaign donations from banks that received money under the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) or political action committees tied to such institutions.
But Frank has hauled in thousands from top execs at Bank of America, Citizens Bank, Wainwright Bank, JP Morgan Chase and other institutions that received billions in TARP money.
Just yesterday, Frank made new campaign finance disclosures showing he received $17,000 from top executives of Bank of America — including $2,000 from CEO Brian Moynihan. B of A received $45 billion in bailout money. In all, Frank has hauled in at least $27,000 since 2009 from bank execs — and $13,000 from PACs — connected to banks that received TARP funding, including:
- $5,000 earlier this month from the Bank of America Corp. Federal PAC.
- $10,000 in August and September from the Bipartisan PAC/Bank of New York Mellon Corp.; Mellon received $3 billion from TARP.
- $2,000 in June 2009 from the Financial Services Roundtable PAC, which counts TARP recipients B of A, JP Morgan Chase and Wells Fargo among its members.
- $1,000 in March from U.S. Bancorp PAC; the Minnesota-based bank received more than $6 billion in TARP funds.
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Video: Bielat and Barney debate last week...
Topics of this clip are the tea party, government spending and deficits.
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