ALG Statement on Obama Signing Financial Takeover Bill

July 21^st, 2010, Fairfax, VA—Americans for Limited Government President Bill Wilson today issued the following statement in response to the signing of the Dodd-Frank financial takeover bill into law:

"Today, Barack Obama claimed that 'the American people will never again be asked to foot the bill for Wall Street's mistakes,' and yet that is exactly what the Dodd-Frank financial takeover will do — it contains a hidden tax to finance a perpetual bailout fund.

"This is taxation without representation. The Dodd-Frank bill authorizes the FDIC to levy without any vote in Congress an unlimited bank tax on bank holding and insurance companies with $50 billion or greater in consolidated assets, the costs of which will be passed on to consumers of financial products, savers, and investors, with more fees, higher premiums, and other hidden costs.

"The bank taxes, which the American people pay for, will finance a so-called 'orderly liquidation fund', which will be used to bail out politically-favored firms and seize disfavored ones, redistributing their assets to privileged constituencies, as GM and Chrysler were redistributed to labor unions.

"Since Obama is saying that bailouts and government takeovers will 'never again' occur, he bears responsibility for signing a bill into law that institutionalizes 'too big to fail' and ensures that the next time there is a crisis the American people will be on the hook, paying hidden taxes to fund more government interventions to prop up failing institutions, all without any vote in Congress."