When a powerful Republican congressman's wife is hired by a bank, and the bank gets a federal taxpayer bailout worth hundreds of millions, what does it mean? That will probably shake itself out. The congressman: House Republican Whip Eric Cantor (R-VA). The wife: Diana Cantor, managing director of the Virginia subsidiary of New York Private Bank and Trust.
Paul Kiel and I just broke the story at Propublica and you can read the whole story here:
http://www.propublica.org/article/bank-employing-gop-house-leaders-wife-got-bailout-bucks-090123In brief:
Rep. Cantor played a key role in getting bipartisan approval for the controversial $700 bank bailout bill in September, although since then he has been a vocal opponent of the surprising way the money is being spent: buying up stock in banks.
Still, it is one of those strange quirks in politics that $267 million of the money is going straight to a privately owned bank where Cantor's wife, Diana, is the managing director at a subsidiary. It's a job she apparently started early last year, after years in finance.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/aram-roston/gop-congressman-cantors-w_b_160420.htmlThis bank is a privately owned bank and caters to the wealthy yet were able to get hundreds of millions of OUR tax dollars to shore up the losses of those wealthy clients. WHAT is wrong with this picture?