Courtesy of Pam Martens.
Bernie Sanders Challenges Hillary Clinton on Her Acceptance of Campaign Funds from Wall Street During the Second Democratic Debate
Everyone has been waiting for the next shoe to drop in the Clinton cash scandals but no one expected Hillary to be the one to drop the shoe. But after making the stunning assertions in last Saturday night’s Democratic debate that most of her donors are “small” and her Wall Street spigot of funding was turned on as a result of her helping New York to rebuild after 9/11 – Hillary, the perpetual Teflon candidate, has been pummeled from Twitter to cable to mainstream media.
Elizabeth Bruenig, writing for the New Republic, pointed out that “large donations make up 81 percent” of Hillary’s current campaign donations, refuting the candidate’s misstatement that “most” of her funding is from small donations. (The chart below from the Center for Responsive Politics provides the actual breakdown.) Bruenig writes further that confidence in Hillary’s assistance in the post 9/11 era “wouldn’t explain the $125 million she and her husband Bill have accepted in personal payment from major firms since 2001, mostly in return for speaking engagements. Nor would it explain why, more than a decade down the line, Hillary Clinton is still making $200,000 per speech at banks like Goldman Sachs.”
Philip Bump of the Washington Post detailed how Hillary’s massive cash flow from Wall Street began prior to 9/11, including her first run for Senator. Bump writes:
“Clinton’s 2000 campaign filing from the FEC reveals 44 donations from Citigroup, 54 from Goldman, 36 from Paine Webber, 43 from Deloitte, 21 from Credit Suisse and 18 from Merrill Lynch and Morgan Stanley. There are a number of other financial firms that appear in the list; these are just the most frequent donors.
“The year 2000 was not the first time that the financial industry was introduced to the Clinton family, of course. It’s worth noting that generosity from Wall Street was extended to Clinton’s husband well before 2001. In 1992, for example, Bill Clinton’s campaign received $853,000 from the financial industry.”
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