Democrat presidential front-runner Hillary Clinton called for the reauthorization of the Export-Import Bank, in what some of her critics are saying is her latest effort to appeal to her financial backers.
Speaking at a campaign stop in New Hampshire, Mrs. Clinton prodded the U.S. Senate to act on a procedural move made by the U.S. House of Representatives to reauthorize the bank.
“For the life of me do not understand the arguments” against it, she said at the event on Wednesday. She also tweeted out her support saying: “We need to reauthorize the Export-Import bank and help American businesses stay in business.”
To some, this endorsement equals nothing more than a payback.
Fred Hochberg, chairman and president of the Ex-Im Bank, has given more than $20,000 to both Bill and Hillary Clinton’s campaigns, and has stayed in the Lincoln Bedroom while Mr. Clinton was president. Mr. Hochberg’s mother, Lillian Vernon, has donated between $35,000 and $75,000 to the Clinton Foundation. And, while Mrs. Clinton was Secretary of State Mr. Hochberg wrote her staff to pass along a note to the Secretary to, thank her personally for her support of the bank.
“Please thank Secretary Clinton for her faith in us,” Mr. Hochberg wrote after Mrs. Clinton gave a positive testimony for the bank.
“Hillary Clinton’s support for the Ex-Im Bank is nothing more than a political calculation,” said Jeff Bechdel, the communications director of America Rising, in a statement. “Clinton’s Ex-Im support isn’t just transparent, it’s unethical, and it’s the latest sign that she will say or do anything to win.”
This week, forty-two Republicans — less than a fifth of the House GOP conference — joined 176 Democrats in signing a rarely used vehicle known as a discharge petition to revive the divisive Export-Import Bank after GOP leadership allowed the agency to lapse June 30 despite financing the sale of U.S. goods overseas for decades.
Its vocal opponents say the bank handed out “corporate welfare” and shouldn’t be allowed to pick winners and losers in the free market.
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