U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin voted for federal budget, even though he's unhappy with certain Wall Street provisions. (Photo courtesy Senate Democrats/flickr)
By Jim Anderson/Illinois Radio Network
WASHINGTON – U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) is pleased, but not entirely, with the new federal budget signed into law by the president this week.
He says it’s a good budget, covering everything except the Department of Homeland Security, which gets a temporary budget until February. He voted for it, even though he’s unhappy that it contains provisions undoing some of the rules banning banks from gambling on derivatives with federally insured funds.
“It was a bad provision, never should have been in this bill. I had to take a look at a 1,600-page bill and decide whether to vote against the whole bill because of two sentences. I’m gonna work to undo it. I think it was the wrong thing to do,” he said.
He called it an “odious” provision, tantamount to Wall Street bankers parking themselves under the mistletoe to get special treatment. He says it was this kind of banking activity that caused the sector to crash, at taxpayers’ expense, six years ago, and which was banned under the Dodd-Frank law in 2010.
U.S. Sen. Mark S. Kirk (R-Ill.) also voted for the budget.
