Last updated on September 25th, 2023 at 01:37 pm
Sen. Bernie Sanders released a statement praising Larry Summers for withdrawing his name from consideration to be the next Fed Chairman, but it was clear that Bernie was happy to see Summers go.
In a statement Sen. Sanders said, “I applaud Larry Summers for withdrawing his name from consideration. The truth is that it was unlikely he would have been confirmed by the Senate. What the American people want now is a Fed chairman prepared to stand up to the greed, recklessness and illegal behavior on Wall Street, not a Wall Street insider whose deregulation efforts helped pave the way for a horrendous financial crisis and the worst economic downturn in the country since the Great Depression. The Fed now must help develop policies which create millions of decent-paying jobs and rebuild the middle class.”
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As Summers wrote in a letter to the president, the simple reality was that he was never going to be confirmed, “I have reluctantly concluded that any possible confirmation process for me would be acrimonious and would not serve the interests of the Federal Reserve, the Administration, or ultimately, the interests of the nation’s ongoing economic recovery.”
Sen. Sanders was correct. We don’t need another Wall Street insider at the Fed. It has long been argued that Summers was one of the reasons why the economic recovery was so slow during the president’s first term. Summers’ myopic ability to only see the economy through the eyes of Wall Street definitely did not help the middle class.
Summers would have been everything that a liberal like Bernie Sanders is fighting against. His nomination and confirmation would have guaranteed a Fed policy that would have been focused on Wall Street at the expense of everyone else. Summers was never going to be confirmed, and Sen. Sanders statement can be read as, “Thanks, for having the decency to get out before we had to throw you out. Don’t let the door hit you in the ass on the way out.”
Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements.
Awards and Professional Memberships
Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association
