I am not a Sanders supporter, but the truth is always important.
Secretary Clinton is chastising Sanders in the Motor State for not voting for the bill that created the funding for an auto bailout. Except, it wasn’t known that the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) bill, designed to bail out Wall Street banks from their subprime mortgage loan debacle that was crashing the economy, would be used to rescue the auto industry at the time Senators Sanders and Clinton voted on it. Clinton voted yay. Sanders voted nay. It was President Bush who signed the bill into law.
In 2008, a separate bill was introduce specifically to bail out the auto industry. Both Clinton and Sanders voted for the bill, but it failed because Republicans voted against it. The Republicans’ reason for voting against the bill was because they wanted to destroy the UAW, which would have benefited from the bailout by having their healthcare fund and pensions protected.
When that bill failed, President Bush wanted to use TARP funds to bailout the auto industry, which would have been a band aid until a better compromise could be worked out.
While Sanders was 100% in favor of aiding the auto industry, is a dogged supporter of labor unions and was a full-throated supporter of the December bill that died in the Senate, he balked at voting for more TARP funds for Wall Street. Clinton voted for the second tranche as she had voted for the first one. And there is no evidence that Clinton voted for TARP as a means to specifically help the auto industry. Rather, she was convinced that the economy could only be saved by bailing out the banks.
It would have taken $79.68 billion to the auto industry at that point, but this $350 Billion bill only provided $4 Billion to the auto industry. As Forbes notes in the article, it’s a bit of a stretch to say Sanders’ “no” vote of a $350 billion bill that only would have provided $4 billion to the auto industry was a sign that he didn’t support the auto industry or a bailout.
Moreover, it’s pretty hard to argue that Clinton’s support of NAFTA hasn’t been far more detrimental to auto jobs in the U.S. than Sanders sticking to his principles on not bailing out Wall Street with tax-payer money.
From International Business Times
Heading into crucial primaries in auto industry states such as Michigan and Ohio, Hillary Clinton in recent days has argued that Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders’ 2009 vote to block the release of Wall Street bailout money proves he “was against the auto bailout” and that he voted “against the money that ended up saving the auto industry.” But other Democratic lawmakers who voted the same way as Sanders are challenging Clinton’s portrayal of that vote.
[...]
Former North Dakota Sen. Byron Dorgan told IBT that the vote in question “was viewed by most as here’s what needs to be done to address the Wall Street issue” and that therefore he voted to block the money because “my view of it was if you don’t add some restrictions now, you’ll never add them, and so for the next year and a half Wall Street was able to work their will on a range of things that should have been done but were never done.”
[...]
A similar sentiment was expressed by Indiana’s former Democratic Sen. Evan Bayh — who also voted with Sanders to block the TARP money.
[...]
“My state, Indiana, is a big auto state, and I was always very strongly in favor of helping the auto companies, and I’m glad we did,” said Bayh, who has endorsed Clinton’s presidential bid. “So I would find it to be very unlikely that I cast something that at the time was perceived as an anti-auto vote.”
h/t DRo