What I'm doing about AIG

Dear Richard,

Hundreds of millions of taxpayers' dollars paying for bonuses at AIG? Using bailout money to line the pockets of the same top executives who mismanaged the company to the point of failure? I just don't think so.

People across the country are outraged by the egregious nature of the AIG bonuses--and rightly so.

This is a perfect example of why we have, and will continue to have a commitment to transparency and oversight in government. When the House of Representatives passed TARP last year, this type of abuse is exactly what the American people were afraid of. We knew there was a chance of waste, fraud or abuse. And now that this has come to light, we have corrected it, and will continue to forge forward together to fix our struggling economy.

Yesterday I managed part of the debate on the bill to take back the AIG bonuses the floor of the House of Representatives, and I wanted to let you know what we're doing in Congress to make sure that our bailout money doesn't end up rewarding AIG executives for their role in damaging our economy. First and foremost, the House has passed legislation to reclaim the bonus money for taxpayers in the form of a 90% tax on the bonuses received by the AIG executives. Here's the details:

• The tax applies to any individual who gets a bonus from a company that received more than $5 billion from TARP.
• It would also apply to bonuses paid by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
• This bill protects taxpayers from future abuses, applying the tax to retention payments or bonuses received after December 31, 2008.
• This bill effectively covers companies receiving over three quarters of the financial rescue funds.

It is fundamentally wrong to be rewarding the same people who ran AIG while it was losing billions of dollars. Their risky schemes directly lead to the $170 billion bailout last year.

Small businesses in Maine and around the country are doing whatever it takes to stay in business and keep people in their jobs, including digging into their own pockets to avoid laying off employees.

And others have come to me and other Representatives and Senators with questions about how they could better use the money in the recovery package to stay in business. They are not looking to line their own pockets, they are asking for help to keep people employed.

These are the people who are stung hardest by the AIG bonuses. Families and businesses in Maine and across the country are struggling to make ends meet and stay in their homes - and they are helping each other out of a shared sense of responsibility. Meanwhile, on Wall Street, we see executives who seem to think they live by a different set of rules and who refuse to take responsibility for the damage they have caused.

Thank you for your support.

Chellie

 
 
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