{"id":62153,"date":"2017-01-04T15:41:07","date_gmt":"2017-01-04T19:41:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/stateofthenation2012.com\/?p=62153"},"modified":"2017-01-04T15:41:07","modified_gmt":"2017-01-04T19:41:07","slug":"donald-trumps-pick-for-treasury-secretary-does-not-drain-the-swamp","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateofthenation2012.com\/?p=62153","title":{"rendered":"Donald Trump\u2019s pick for Treasury secretary does not drain the swamp"},"content":{"rendered":"
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POLITICS <\/a><\/span><\/p>\n
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Bank Owned By Trump\u2019s Top Treasury Pick Foreclosed On A 90-Year-Old Over 27 Cents<\/h1>\n

Steven Mnuchin is likely to face tough questions about his record at OneWest bank, which had a track record of preying on the elderly.<\/h2>\n

Kim Bellware Reporter, The Huffington Post<\/p>\n

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The shady history of the bank owned by\u00a0Steven Mnuchin<\/a>, Donald Trump\u2019s pick for Treasury secretary, is only getting darker as details of the institution\u2019s often ruthless practices resurface.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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As a multi-millionaire hedge funder, Mnuchin fattened his personal fortune through his co-ownership of OneWest, a California-based bank that profited during the height of the financial crisis by engaging in an array of unethical practices. OneWest made predatory loans to the elderly via reverse mortgages<\/a> and went on to aggressively foreclose on people\u2019s homes, according to regulators and watchdogs.\u00a0Housing advocacy groups accused the bank of racist lending practices like redlining<\/a>, which is illegal under the Fair Housing Act.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Drew Angerer\/Getty Images<\/div>
Steve Mnuchin, President-elect Trump\u2019s choice for Treasury Secretary, arrives at Trump Tower\u00a0on Thursda in New York City.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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One of the most egregious examples was the story of Ossie Lofton, a 90-year-old Lakeland, Florida, homeowner on a reverse mortgage whom OneWest foreclosed on over a 27-cent payment error with her insurance.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Lofton paid a bill to a OneWest subsidiary that was short 30 cents in late 2014, according to Politico<\/a>. When she was billed for the change, she mistakenly sent a check for 3 cents rather than 30. By November, the bank had taken her home.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Foreclosing on the homes of customers to whom they had written bad loans and reverse mortgages yielded big profits for the bank. OneWest singlehandedly accounted for\u00a039 percent<\/a> of all reverse mortgage foreclosures after the housing collapse.\u00a0A California housing advocacy group called OneWest a \u201cforeclosure machine<\/a>\u201d that affected more than 36,000 homeowners under Mnuchin, according to NPR.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Elderly homeowners in reverse mortgages can still lose their homes if they fall behind on maintaining the home or meeting insurance or tax payments.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Trump\u2019s Wednesday announcement of Mnuchin\u2019s nomination is yet another instance of the president-elect failing to uphold his campaign promise to root out insider and big money influence in Washington.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cMr. Trump promised the American people he would \u2018drain the swamp,\u2019 but his nominee to lead the Treasury Department has a track record of profiting by foreclosing on older homeowners and homeowners in communities of color,\u201d\u00a0Alys Cohen, an attorney for the advocacy group National Consumer Law Center, said in a statement.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Cohen called on Mnuchin to use his power, if confirmed, to \u201chelp Main Street recover from the economic crisis caused by Wall Street, not to benefit the 1%.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Mnuchin, 53, is a financial insider and Goldman Sachs veteran who\u00a0Pro Publica<\/a>\u00a0described as having been born into \u201cWall Street royalty.\u201d Currently, he\u2019s the co-chief executive of Dune Capital, a private hedge fund. Mnuchin has also invested in hit box-office films like this summer\u2019s \u201cSuicide Squad\u201d and executive produced others, like \u201cMad Max: Fury Road.\u201d He emerged as an early fundraiser for Trump\u2019s campaign, but has in the past backed both Republican and Democratic candidates, including Hillary Clinton.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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As The Huffington Post previously reported,\u00a0if Mnuchin\u2019s nomination is confirmed by the Senate, he will have sweeping authority over the very financial industry from which he made his fortune<\/a>, as well as the opportunity to influence Trump\u2019s economic policies.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Mnuchin will more than likely have to answer for OneWest\u2019s track record during his Senate confirmation hearing. And even if he sells off his Dune Capital holdings to avoid a glaring conflict of interest, his deep ties to Wall Street could prove impossible to untangle.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Marcus Stanley, policy director at the nonprofit coalition Americans for Financial Reform told The Washington Post that Mnuchin is \u201cthe ultimate Wall Street insider, a wheeler-dealer.<\/a>\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cThat gives us a lot of concern,\u201d he said. \u201cWe are opposed to having people who are Wall Street insiders being the people who regulate Wall Street.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/header>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n

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\nhttp:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/entry\/steven-mnuchin-bank_us_584059d9e4b0c68e047f625a<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

POLITICS Bank Owned By Trump\u2019s Top Treasury Pick Foreclosed On A 90-Year-Old Over 27 Cents<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-62153","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation2012.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62153","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation2012.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation2012.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation2012.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation2012.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=62153"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation2012.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62153\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation2012.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=62153"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation2012.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=62153"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation2012.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=62153"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}