As Congress Takes Up Sweeping Financial Reform, Report Urges Fundamental Change of Ratings Agency Model
Washington, DC — With the House of Representatives and a key Senate committee poised to vote on sweeping financial industry reforms, a new report by Demos finds that the proposed remedies fail to fully address the problems that led the credit rating agencies to become key enablers of the housing bubble and Wall Street meltdown.
The Disparate Impact standard is critical to continued and enhanced opportunity to access fair credit, housing, and homeownership. Demos strongly opposes efforts to undermine this longstanding enforcement tool.
K. Sabeel Rahman and Hollie Russon Gilman's new book, Civic Power, calls for a broader approach to democratic reform, offering a critical framework and concrete suggestions to support those reforms that meaningfully redistribute power to citizens.
Washington, DC — Today, thousands of Americans are gathering on the streets of Chicago to march against financial service industry excess that has cost the American taxpayers trillions of dollars, destabilized the economy and undermined the stability of millions of US households.
In response to the public outcry against excesses in the financial services industries, dubbed "The Showdown in Chicago", the following statement was issued from Heather McGhee, director of the Washington DC, Office for the public policy and research center Demos:
It is time for us to recognize the right of sovereignty and self-determination for the over 4 million combined residents of Puerto Rico, Guam, the U.S. Virgin Islands, American Samoa, the Northern Mariana Islands, and Washington, D.C.
Ensuring just and equitable access to and ownership of one our most vital natural resources—energy—is vital to building a vibrant, inclusive democracy.
We urge Ohio to take immediate action to ease and modify absentee ballot
laws so that thousands of voters are not disenfranchised during Ohio’s March 17, 2020 primary.
The global coronavirus pandemic threatens to disrupt the Presidential
Preference Primary election in Florida. The extension of vote-by-mail options and other accommodations at polling places is necessary.
Arguments Heard Today Suggest Precedents Limiting Corporate Political Influence Under Threat
Washington, DC — Today's argument in Citizens United v. FEC suggests that the Roberts Court is poised to sweep aside century-old restraints on corporate domination of the political marketplace — unless the wisdom of the Court's newest member proves persuasive when the decision is ultimately written.