I think its the wrong move for Senior Citizens of this countryv who depend on medicare and orsi medicaid, people of all ages. Its clearly the wrong move for our country. I yield the floor. The senate is now debating the nomination of steven minh ah nguyen to be the secretary of treasury. This is yet another nomination on which the majority has walked away unfortunately from a 20 year approach when it comes to the vetting process. Vet the vetting issue came up and both sides of the finance committee carried thee investigation out to its conclusion, the situation has turned out quite differently this time. There were several properties il the United States and abroad where there was a hundred Million Dollars missing from the disclosure. He failed to disclose several in he m he misled the public and the committee about the foreclosure tactics and he appears to have hidden key data requested by members of this body. Frankly, i dont believe these investigations wouldve been uncovered at all if not for the work of the minorities investigations team. The majority looked the other way and the vetting process wass ended prematurely. The vote on this nomination is eminent. S thats the first concern held on the side and i will speak more about that today and as thisub madam i want to focus on the substance of our concern. Madam president , the single biggest challenge is what to do to reconnect working americans with this Country Economic engine. There are communities across the land including many in my home state of oregon where folks are just waiting for economic recovery to show up. They see their homes foreclosedo stores boarded up and they just feel stuck. Aside from the president himself , nobody in america has greater influence over this nations Economic Future than the United States treasury secretary. Thats the case whether its through tax reform that sitesde unfairness and wall street home. Abuses and infrastructure in trade policy that creates good paying jobs here at home. They call them red, white and blue jobs. The person who becomes treasury secretary has to be somebody who is ready to work on behalf of all americans including those americans from the corners of our nation where optimism has dimmed. If steven nguyens record is any indication, he simply doesnt fit that mold, not even close. There is a lot to debate as the Senate Considers his nomination. Particularly significant is the Ranking Member on the Senate Finance committee is the issuehe of how our tax code punishes the wage earning americans. I will cover that this morning. C in my view come the debate begins with the story of one west. Mr. Minasians bank. It begins with gory details of how one must industrialize the process of kicking people out of their homes and onto the street. It begins with the details of how he enriched himself at thehe same time his foreclosure machine was running. As i described the financial crisis as a personal setback from which a lot of Americans Still have not recovered, but for him, it was not exactly a setback at all. In fact, it was the deal of a mn lifetime. To in march 2009 mr. Minasian led a group of investors that are several banks engulfed in crisis the year before. He and his group got an unusually sweet deal buying 23 and half billion dollars worth of assets to less than 1. 6 billion. Indy. Was renamed one west bank and it opened up shop the next day. As part of this deal he got what was known as a shared losst insa agreement from the federal deposit insurance corporation. Under the deal with one west, the corporation made nearly 900 million in payments for indy. Loans. It included payments to loans si made in subsidiaries, photo First Federal lafayette came to one point to 2 billion. It didnt take long after he rolled out the newly branded one west for the bank to be investigated by state attorney generals around the country. Already they had big concern about one west foreclosurehe practices. Eginning see the guts of the foreclosure machine beginning to show itself as part of this investigation, one w. West president that worked under him admitted under oath to the practice known as robo signing. This witness said she signed more than 750 foreclosure documents a week without reading them, and with no notary presens during the process. That is a violation of the law. When asked how much time she spends executing each foreclosure documents she said, i changed my signature considerably. Its just an e. No more than 30 seconds and it wasnt just missed johnson purge she was part of an entire team operating at this pace. In her deposition she stated there were about 1100 documents signed by her office each day or roughly 6000. Week. Here you have an economic meltdown, our nation facing an certain future. He found a way to cross it. He bought a bank at an extreme discount. He struck a deal with the federal Deposit Corporation so he could be reimbursed for 80 or more of the banks losses. He held at least one team in place that could sign 6000 6000 individuals and families thrown into this nightmare of potentially losing their homes. F mr. Minasian and one west were turning out foreclosures with ruthless efficiency. Look o it doesnt sound to me like that is somebody who is going to be the kind of person who will look out for the interests of working families. I want to talk a little bit about some who are victimized by one west industrialize foreclosures. Ee one of those was d robert finn who in 2010 shared her story with the orlando sentinel. Shes had her parents were struggling to pay off the balance of their mortgage with one west. The mortgage had a balance of just 3000 she was trying to help her parents get to the finish line. Instead of the usual mortgage payment of 600 they demanded over a thousand dollars a month. One west said the home was in foreclosure and wanted 4000 ine a Attorney Fees but they had never received a foreclosure notice. Es when she called one west to sort things out, it was just one big runaround. Joe is an army retiree who needed cash to finish an addition on a modest ranch style home in pasadena maryland. He and his wife had owned the home for 23 years. According to a story in the baltimore sun, he discovered the monthly cost for the new loan was much higher than he expected. Bi instead of the 3200dollar monthly bill, it was almost 4300. One west which took over the servicing of his loan in 2009 denied nine denied his request for modification in october october 2010. A month after it had started foreclosure proceedings. He struggled with the process and he hired an attorney who noted something that struck him as very odd. Signatures on the foreclosure documents were signed under the same lawyers name. Even with this discovery of false signatures, he did notro bring about the speedy modification that he was hopingd for. Until her brother was murdered in 2009 and the family lost her income. The next mortgage payment was two weeks late. Onewest said it wouldnt accept. She had to apply for a loan modification instead. But onewest didnt actually own the mortgage. They were only servicing it. They didnt even have the authority to grant a modification. So this citizen was caught in so this citizen was caught in the citizen was caught in limbo for two years unable to modify the loan, at the same time had to fight eviction. Out of options, theres a group of protesters i went to his home protesting outside and demanding answers. Shortly thereafter despite one less planes there was nothing they could do to help. They relented. She was allowed to keep her home. But it took essentially a four alarm Public Relation calamity to make that happen. Another case mr. Mnuchin may have heard about. Hey they sued in superior court and they won. Ill describe a little bit for the San Francisco chronicle how the case played out. While they were making dozens of calls and submitting reams of paperwork to get a loan m modification from on onewest, another department of the bank proceeded to foreclose on their home. This is especially important,ce madam president , because this is a phenomenon known as dual tracking. Onewest strong them along for months before telling them just to send in their loan modification. They said they would have an answer in 3060 days. But instead of a modification they got an eviction notice. They were forced out of their home while ms. Jin was eight months pregnant and grappling with a Breast Cancer diagnosis. They were left with no choice but to take onewest to court. Their legal battle stretched foo more than two years. The costs were so substantial in that even a victory in court could not save their home. Mples now, these are all examples of t typical mortgages, everyday homeowners caught up in onewest, exceptional and ruthless foreclosure practices. But it wasnt just your typical mortgage that onewest foreclose. On. The bank had a big reverse mortgage operation called w financial freedom. And the foreclosure machine was running and running and running over there, too. The goal of a reverse mortgage is to give older people, 62 or older, the opportunity to use equity in their homes to help cover the bills. Unfortunately, doesnt always go smoothly. In onewest reverse mortgageibly division, it often went terribly wrong. A lot of older couples o modest income to come reverse mortgages put that under only one name, often the husband. So but heres the catch. If the person whose name appeared on the documents passed away, the terms of the reverse mortgage required alon the loane paid back in full. If it wasnt, then the foreclosure process once again kicks in. So you have the family where first they lose their loved one, then they lose their home, and mo nightmare scenario of a reverse mortgage. The common name for this practice, madam president , almost hurts to say it, is widow foreclosure, widow foreclosure. According to documents reviewed by the california reinvestment coalition, during the first six years, mr. Mnuchin ran onewest l bank account. 40 of all federally insured were First Mortgage foreclosures. They led the nation in widowyouk foreclosures. You think about what you can lead the nation in, thinking about trying to help hardhit families, that types the films i just described. Id like to lead the nation in terms of reaching out and finding imaginative ways to helr them, to really go to bat for them. Take them through the process, create something that is fair and common sense. Forecl they lead the nation in widow foreclosures. In one case, onewest and its predecessor try to foreclose on an older florida woman. That was twice. The first time mr. Miniatures bank tried to foreclose on her home and filed paperwork saying she didnt live there. When the final discovered thatac she in fact did live in the home, they backed off. Two years later, onewest new boa Parent Company cit where mr. Mnuchin was a board member trying to foreclose again. This time it was over an unpaidw bill 27 cents. Now, this involved a woman who was 90, a woman who was 90 was involved in a foreclosure with an unpaid bill of 27 cents. She had to fight to keep hernd home twice, because she was bombarded with patty and inaccurate allegations from mr. L mnuchins bank that the president recently twittered out an allegation that if the story was fake news because the elderly woman never actually lost her home. The there were deals onewest foreclosure machine put herfores through, certainly was not fakeo news to her, and others who were up against this activity. Thr while onewest was putting thousands of homeowners through the nightmare of foreclosure, mr. Mnuchin used the banks money to make some pretty flashyin S Investments in hollywood. In september 2012, onewest led y group of Financial Institutions rela Credit Facility for Relativity Media of hundreds of thousands of dollars. Relativity was a movie studio led by flamboyant executive named ryan cavanaugh. Press accounts also claimed that mr. Mnuchin and mr. Cavanaugh became good friends. In fact, that mr. Cavanaugh was a client who owed his Bank Hundreds and millions of dollars, he and mr. Mnuchin bought a private jet together and then travel to various kinds of film festivals around the world. World they were even investing in real estate together. They put millions into a shell company, hm bac llc which owned property in southern california. Decided to buy intovanaugh mr. Cavanaugh was movie studio himself. He purchased, was appointed cochairman of relativity. So while he was pulling double duty on the boards of onewest and relativity, onewest had rela loans the bank was making to cat relativity. As they share of bank capital, onewest insider loans exceeded 94 of the countries biggest 100 Financial Institutions. Unfortunately, mr. Mnuchins time with relativity didnt go so hot. Each year from 20122014 the studio 78 or nine bigger losses. Finally in 2015 relativity is problems came to an end head to head but it owned onewest and mr. Mnuchin a huge sum of money. On may 29, 2015 mr. Mnuchin quit the board. A few days later funds totallyer 50 million in cash totaling were swept back to onewest from several relativity operating accounts. One of those accounts was earmarked to pay guild expenses, salaries for everyday contractors and production tradespeople. Thats what the nail and relativity his coffin and the studio declared bankruptcy. Mr. Mnuchins adventure putting onewest money into relativity mightve been a big mess, but it sure didnt do much damage to the banks bottom line. Around the time relativity t crumbled him onewest was purchased by an even bigger group, the cit group, and a massive profit. Mr. Mnuchin and his investorsor originally bought the bank in 2009 for less than one point 6 million. In 2015 cit group audit from mr. Mnuchin and his partners for 3. 4 billion. In between, while tens of thousands of americans were going through this daily nightmare of losing their homes, the bank had paid out more than 1 billion in dividends to mr. Mnuchin and others. Buying onewest was literally the deal of a lifetime for mr. Mnuchin. But the bank conduct caught the attention of federal watchdog more than once. In 2011 the office of thrift supervision conducted an examination of the onewest a foreclosure process. Im just an outline a few of the findings. These are the findings done by the office of thrift supervision thats in the business of monitoring and examining these institutions. Il they found, for example, onewest employs file affidavit and staty and federal courts falsely stating that they conducted a review and have personald knowledge regarding the detail of the disputed mortgage including principal and interest due or other fees and expenses when no such reviews should have taken place. Onewest employs file documents in state and federal courts thae in the presence of a notary. Onewest litigated foreclosure and bankruptcy proceedings without ensuring that the promissory notes were properly endorsed or assigned and in possession of the appropriate party at the appropriate time. Es onewest failed to devote sufficient resources to the administration of its foreclosure in loan modification procedures. And onewest management failed to enact adequate internal oversight and controls to its fe foreclosure processes. And finally onewest failed to adequately oversee the outside lawyers handling the foreclosure circuit. The office of thrift supervision demanded that onewest take corrective action, and issued whats known as a Consent Order. Basically in english this onewest Consent Order was an u agreement to clean up its act. The order was signed personally by mr. Mnuchin and the onewest board of directors. They had been running onewest for two years at this point and the company was right with problems. Ime it in 2014 another watchdog stepped in. This time it was the office of the comptroller of the currencye their audits and more than 10,000 onewest borrowers were due 8. 5 million for improper foreclosure practice. According to the same report onewest paid nearly 3 million to 54 borrowers for violations of the servicemembers civil relief act which protects members of our Armed Services from losing their homes while they are serving our country. So just think about that one. Heres the bank having to pay borrowers 53 million forers civ violations of the members Civil Service relief act. This is what protects the courageous people who served our country. Its a law that protects these people from losing their homes while they put themselves at mak great risk, they make the ultimate sacrifice, and everyday their families at home are worrying about them and worrying about their finances. According to this report, onewest paid nearly 3 million to 54 borrowers who violated this law that protects courageous men and women who wear the uniform of the United States. At the heart of these investigations was the issue of robosigning, the practice ive spoke about earlier in the context of the onewest team turning out 6000 foreclosure our senator casey, senator brown on our Committee Really zeroed in on this issue, and it was particularly concerning in this context senator casey who represents a lot of people who lost their homes to foreclosure by mr. Mnuchins bank. So senator casey with a question to mr. Mnuchin writing after mr. Mnuchin had this finance committee hearing. Senator casey asked pretty simple, did onewest robosign documents . This is a straightforward question, and based on the public record, the answer should have been a straightforward yes. Instead, mr. Mnuchin replied,ot onewest bank did not robosign documents. Roof now, madam president , years of documented proof says that is false. So the Committee Gave mr. Mnuchin an opportunity to amend his response. R. Once again mr. Mnuchin denied, denied the truth. Distinc first he said the concept of robosigning generally referred to a sign of a foreclosure affidavit attesting to fax them were not verified to be accurate. Or a sign of a foreclosure but it himself or herself to be someone else. So this is a fancy way to explain when we give him an opportunity to amend his answer, mr. Mnuchin again denying the truth on this question ofobodocn onewest, signing robo documents. And he went on to say, onewest did not do these things. Now, theres just no way of getting around it, none. That statement is flat wrong. The language mr. Mnuchin used to redefine, did you find robosigning is nearly identical to the language used by the office of thrift supervision in the findings of itsatchdogs investigation. Given the watchdogs report, testimony from onewest employees and the public record, mr. Mnuchin cannot possibly in good faith claim that onewest did not robosign. In fact, mr. Mnuchins signature is on one of the documents that proves otherwise. The office of thrift supervision Consent Order. He ran the bank. Surely he had to read the document before signing it. The so mr. Mnuchin misled the o finance committee and the American People on robo signings, directly contradicting a mountain of evidence. So senators casey and rhonda represent states where a lot of families got hammered through foreclosure, foreclosure isnto pursued by mr. Mnuchin spank him they decided to do more digging into the information. Senator casey sought onewest National Foreclosure figures. Senator brown asked for a state by state breakdown. This information was never provided. Now, first mr. Mnuchin said he just couldnt get the data. Then senator heller made a similar request. It seems mr. Mnuchin and get sufficient to satisfy mr. Heller who state had a large number of onewest foreclosures. So in my mind that raises the question about why a republican senator could get his inquiry answered, but a pair of democrats could not. Getting of the basic facts from mr. Mnuchin was pretty much a an painful time like the dentist pulling teeth. Heres an example the finance committee request all nominees list all positions held as an officer, director trustee, partner provider agent rep or consult with any corporation, company, firm partnership, other Business Enterprise or educational or otherwhen institution. When mr. Mnuchin filed his paperwork with the committee, he signed them attesting that the document was true, accurate and complete. However, it became apparent to many staff that information was missing, in particular sec filings indicated that mr. Mnuchin was director of dune capital international. Thats an entity located in the cayman islands. It was nowhere to be found in mr. Mnuchins paperwork. E he also failed to disclose his role as chairman and ceo of the onewest foundation, an entity that is alleged to have made generous donations to groups that publicly endorsed onewest controversial purchase by cit group. He even failed to report that he had been chairman of the imb hold company, the Holding Company that he used to purchask indie mac, the bank that he turned into onewest. Y all told after questions werein raised by the finance Committee Staff, mr. Mnuchin disclosed that he held positions in an additional 14 entities that were not listed on his initial paperwork. Heres an example of mr. Mnuchins failure to fully disclose his variouS Investments. The finance committee request all nominees list the identity and value of all assets, all assets held directly or indirectly with a value of, 1000. Thats pretty straightforward, madam president , the entity, te identity and value of all assets held directly or indirectly with a value in excess of 1000 was to be disclosed. Mr. Mnuchin failed to do this as well. On his initial paperwork, Committee Staff noted mr. Ac mnuchin listed membership in a vacation resort in mexico but he didnt disclose any related property. And that was the only, that was only the first case of missing mnuchin real estate. After questioning by Committee Staff, mr. Mnuchin disclosed still more missing mnuchin real estate, an additional 95 million in Real Estate Holdings that had not been listed on his initial paperwork. The fact is the committee had to take the time to ask the questions to track down these multimillion dollar properties, mr. Mnuchins undisclosed business relationships. And i will say again, madam president , i am convinced that none of what i have described is undisclosed assets comed substantial undisclosed assets, would have ever been brought to light if it wasnt for the work of the committees minority staff investigators. And yet despite these efforts, mr. Mnuchin still has nevers produced information requested by two members of the finance committee, senator casey, senator brown concerning the onewest foreclosure my view is, madam president , this is another nominee who has the ethics alarm bell sounding. He has already misled theation r public. He appears to be concealing to information requested i members of this body, and his claim to w fame is the cold and staggering efficiency with which his bank booted predatory lending victims out of their home. I just dont think this is the type of person who should lead the treasury secretary. And i will simply close because we will have further discussion on this, madam president , about the kind of person i want to see had the treasury department. I want to note i support a number of republicans for this particular position in my time on the finance committee. O i want the kind of person whos going to give everybody in america the opportunity to get ahead. We are going to have more and discussions about taxes earned,s particularly important in this role will be the treasury secretaries of you of taxes. We have a tax code that is really the tale of two systems. If you are a cop or a nurse in west virginia, madam president , or in oregon, your taxes are compulsory. Once or twice a month your taxes are just lifted out of your paycheck. If you are a working person, thats the way it works in west virginia. Thats the way it works in oregon. But if you have a battery ofu cn Financial Experts, it doesnt work that way. You can use that battery ofu Financial Experts to pay what you want when you want to, and may be not much at all. I want somebody for this position who feels passionately about giving everybody in america the opportunity to get ahead, who really understands what a priority it is to work to bring economic recovery to those communities damned by hardship and folks suffering. I noticed a number of people like that, and the president of the Senate States and there sure are a lot of them in my homeik state in oregon, a lot of those Rural Communities just feel like theyve been hit by a wrecking ball. Ary i so thats the kind of treasury secretary i want. N treasury secretary who giveseria everybody in america the opportunity to get ahead. And thus far i just dont see mr. Mnuchin sitting fitting that mold. We will go on to talk about other issues next week, particularly is a view with respect to taxes, and i urge my colleagues to oppose this nomination and we will have further discussion on it next week. And with that, madam president , i yielded the floor and i would note the absence of a quorum. The u. S. Senate comes back into session at noon eastern on monday to continue debating the nomination of Steven Mnuchin to be treasury secretary pick his nomination cleared procedural hurdle earlier this morning around 2 a. M. Eastern. And a confirmation vote on Steven Mnuchin is scheduled for monday at 7 p. M. Eastern when the senate is back in session, we will have live coverage here on cspan2. Cspan2. Next thursday is another cabinet nominee, fast food executive and a poster, president trumps picked to lead the Labor Department pick his confirmation hearing thursday at 10 a. M. Eastern. You can see that live on cspan3 online acspan3online at cspann on the cspan radio app. Cspan, where history unfolds daily. In 1979, cspan was greater as a Public Service by americas cabletelevision companies and is brought to you today by your cable or satellite provider. The u. S. Armies top general in in afghanistan told congress yesterday that the country is in a quote stalemate and a few thousand more troops are needed. The general John Nicholson testified before the senate Armed Services committee for about two hours