A reality based independent journal of observation & analysis, serving the Flathead Valley & Montana since 2006. © James Conner.

1 July 2016

Sen. Tester votes against hedge fund slavery for Puerto Rico

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Along with Senators Elizabeth Warren, Sherrod Brown, Jeff Merkley, Bernie Sanders, and nine other Democrats, Jon Tester voted against the Puerto Rico Oversight, Management, and Economic Stability Act two days ago. Puerto Rico is in big financial trouble and needs help, but Tester and his colleagues considered PROMESA too harsh.

Sen. Steve Daines also voted against PROMESA, but I’ve found no evidence he considered the bill too draconian.

And draconian it is, reports Isaiah Poole at the Campaign for America’s future:

The legislation – which has the acronym PROMESA, Spanish for “promise” – imposes on the island’s approximately 3.5 million residents a financial control board that will determine how the government spends its money and how businesses on the island are regulated. That control board would have the power to slash government spending in order to ensure that Wall Street investors who purchased Puerto Rico bonds would be paid.

It also allows the federal minimum wage on the island to be lowered to $4.25 an hour for workers 24 and under. Plus, businesses in Puerto Rico would not have to comply with regulations that would increase the number of workers eligible for overtime pay that will go into effect December 1. That means workers earning as little as $24,000 a year could be asked to work 50, 60, 70 hours or more a week without earning an extra dime in pay.

The legislation sends an unmistakable message: If you are a financially struggling Puerto Rican – and that is most of the island’s residents – you will be expected to sacrifice more: fewer government services, lower wages and higher taxes. For the wealthy, it says, in so many words, “We got your back.”

Worse, reports Poole:

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton supported this legislation, calling it “imperfect” but nonetheless joining a number of House and Senate Democrats who felt pressured by the July 1 default deadline to agree to many of the demands of conservative Republicans and Wall Street lobbyists.

Sen. Bernie Sanders, on the other hand, was among the Democrats who voted against the bill, calling it on the Senate floor “legislation smacking of the worst form of colonialism, in the sense that it takes away all of the important democratic rights of the American citizens of Puerto Rico.”

A tip of the hat to you, Sen. Tester, for voting against this shameful hedge fund relief act.