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Concerns about bank size and interconnectedness have reached a fever pitch lately for a number of reasons. Here's why.
April 1 -
U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said Wednesday that a bank's size can make it difficult to prosecute, adding significant weight to critics' concerns that some institutions are "too big to jail."
March 6 -
Attorney General Eric Holder's stunning admission that it was difficult to prosecute large banks because of the potential economic impact adds significant ammunition to those seeking to break up such institutions.
March 6
WASHINGTON — Several activists groups were planning Tuesday to deliver a petition with more than 300,000 signatures calling for the Obama administration to "repudiate" Attorney General Eric Holder's recent comments suggesting some banks are "too big to jail."
The groups, including MoveOn.org, were planning to deliver the petition to more than a dozen Justice Department offices across the country.
"More than a quarter million Americans have come together to declare that no one should be above the law — and especially not the Wall Street bankers who crashed the economy," Brian Kettenring, executive director of the Campaign for a Fair Settlement, said in a joint press release with the other groups.
In addition Kettenring's group and MoveOn, the petition was also sponsored by CREDO Action, Home Defenders League and the Courage Campaign. In all, more than 330,000 signatures were collected.
"The top cops at the Justice Department have simply refused to hold banks accountable for criminal behavior," Becky Bond, CREDO's political director, said in the press release.
The groups planned petition drops in Charlotte, N.C., Philadelphia, Atlanta, Pittsburgh, Minneapolis, St. Louis, Mo., Los Angeles, Sacramento, Calif., and Little Rock, Ark.
Holder drew heavy criticism last month when he made
"I am concerned that the size of some of these institutions becomes so large that it does become difficult for us to prosecute them when we are hit with indications that if we do prosecute — if we do bring a criminal charge — it will have a negative impact on the national economy, perhaps even the world economy," Holder said.
A Justice Department spokeswoman said Tuesday that "no person and no corporation is above the law."
"What the Attorney General said is that the size of some of these institutions can increase the difficulty of already complex prosecutions, since federal prosecutors are required to consider — among other factors — the effect that a criminal prosecution may have on the thousands of investors, pension holders, customers, employees and the public — innocent people who had nothing to do with the criminal conduct," said Adora Andy Jenkins, a spokeswoman for the Justice Department. "These are among the many factors that we weigh — they are not bars to prosecution — and will not prevent the Justice Department from continuing to be aggressive and creative in pursuing prosecutions and seeking penalties in appropriate cases as we have been doing."
