Video: Darrell Issa
The Ulsterman Report - Banking Scandal Lurking for Obama in 2011?
Congressman Issa discuss his investigation of the timing of the FDIC's takeover of Illinois' troubled (and politically connected) Broadway Bank. Did the FDIC delay its takeover to help Obama friend, Democrat Senate candidate and bank owner Alexi Giannoulias?
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Issa: Why so late with the Broadway Bank takeover? - Washington Examiner
As his family’s Broadway Bank was failing, Illinois Democratic Senate candidate Alexi Giannoulias was meeting with White House officials, complains Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., the ranking Republican on the House Oversight Committee. Issa now wonders whether Broadway might have received special treatment due to politics, and he has written FDIC Chairwoman Sheila Bair asking why Broadway Bank wasn’t taken over sooner.
He writes:
- The $394.3 million cost of taking over Broadway represents a loss of approximately 36 percent of Broadway's assets to the FDIC. The amount of the Broadway loss, both in dollars and as a percentage of total deposits, is significantly higher than those figures for the other six Illinois banks closed on April 23, 2010. These figures suggest that the FDIC may have waited longer than it should have to act to prevent foreseeable losses in the case of Broadway Bank.
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Issa: Did FDIC help Broadway Bank? - Politico
“The high losses in the case of Broadway Bank suggest there may be a bias in the way the FDIC evaluates when to take action on a distressed bank,” Issa writes to Bair. “Was Mr. Giannoulias’ candidacy for the United States Senate considered when the FDIC was deliberating about whether to take action on Broadway Bank?”
Issa also wants to know if the White House knew anything about the bank closure. The FDIC in late January warned Broadway Bank that it needed to raise more capital. On March 9, Giannoulias met with White House Senior Adviser David Axelrod, Issa says.
“The fact that senior White House officials such as David Axelrod are meeting with Mr. Giannoulias at the time the FDIC is covering hundreds of millions in losses at Broadway Bank raised a flag,” Issa said.
Issa, who is extremely aggressive in his investigations, is demanding answers to why the FDIC waited until April to close the bank and he wants to know what the costs would have been if the feds took the bank when it was “critically undercapitalized.”
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