SVB collapse: Financial committee lawmakers took thousands in donations from bank
Gabe Kaminsky
Video Embed
Members of Congress on key committees overseeing the banking industry have received tens of thousands of dollars in campaign donations from Silicon Valley Bank, according to records.
SVB’s collapse last Friday has sparked banking crisis fears across the United States, while federal regulators have said the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation is stepping in to make sure depositors “have access to all their money.” Eight senators and House members received almost $45,000 in campaign donations from SVB’s political action committee between 2012 and 2022, according to Federal Election Commission records reviewed by the Washington Examiner.
SVB COLLAPSE: FIRST REPUBLIC BANK’S RATING SLASHED TO JUNK STATUS
“Giant political contributions are legalized corruption,” Joshua Graham Lynn, CEO of RepresentUs, an anti-corruption watchdog, told the Washington Examiner. “It’s one of the reasons why Americans have ‘statistically zero impact’ on policies passed by Congress. And it’s why crisis after avoidable crisis keeps happening. From the poisonous smoke over East Palestine to the fallout of Silicon Valley Bank, the American people keep paying the price of corruption. Enough is enough: We need to pass commonsense anti-corruption laws now.”
There hasn’t been a bank failure on the scale of SVB’s since the fall of Washington Mutual during the 2008 financial crisis. Amid the Federal Reserve aggressively raising interest rates, SVB’s tech stock holdings and long-term bonds eroded in value. Venture capital firms advised customers to pull their funds from the bank, culminating in $42 billion being withdrawn in a single day.
“Shareholders and certain unsecured debt holders will not be protected,” the Treasury Department, the Federal Reserve, and the FDIC said in a statement on Sunday. “Senior management has also been removed. Any losses to the Deposit Insurance Fund to support uninsured depositors will be recovered by a special assessment on banks, as required by law.”
Among the eight lawmakers, Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA) has received the most through the years in campaign donations, $21,600, from SVB’s PAC, filings show. The Democrat, who has long sat on the Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee, received the funds between 2013 and 2022.
In 2016, SVB’s then-CEO Greg Becker hosted a campaign fundraiser for Warner in Menlo, California, according to a flyer. Warner notably supported a 2017 bill loosening bank regulations that was signed by former President Donald Trump and mirrored a 2015 measure that trade groups representing SVB lobbied in connection to, the Washington Examiner reported.
House Financial Services Committee Chairman Patrick McHenry (R-NC) received $10,000 from the bank’s PAC between 2015 and 2022, filings show. The Republican was on the committee for those years and has called for an investigation into SVB’s “supervisory failures.”
Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-NY), a member of the House Financial Services Committee, received $3,500 in campaign donations between 2020 and 2022 from the PAC, records show. Others on that committee who have received campaign money from the bank include Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA), who took $2,500 in 2020, Rep. French Hill (R-AR), who took $1,000 in 2019, and Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ), who took $1,000 in 2017.
“Yes, I will send it back,” Waters, referring to the donation, told Politico on Tuesday.
In addition, lawmakers who received campaign donations from the PAC include Sens. Tim Scott (R-SC) and Jon Tester (D-MT), members of the Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee, filings show. Scott received $3,700 in 2015, and Tester took $5,000 between 2012 and 2017.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
Waters is not alone in announcing steps to return SVB-linked cash. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) has given a $2,700 campaign donation he received in 2015 from the PAC, as well as $5,800 in 2021 from Becker, to charities in New York, according to his office.
During the 2022 midterm elections cycle, SVB employees gave over $35,000 to Democrats and over $9,600 to Republicans, according to filings.