Elizabeth Warren Goads GOP Senator To Let Her Speak By Calling Him A Chicken

Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) shamed her Republican colleague into giving her a chance to answer his question by clucking at him like a chicken during a Senate Banking Committee hearing on Tuesday.

During the hearing, Senator Thom Tillis (R-NC) demanded to know if there has ever been an example of credit card rate caps or fee cuts being implemented and succeeding, as Democrats and consumer advocates continue to push for caps on rates to make credit card payments more affordable.

“Point to the one time in the whole history of the world at credit cards globally where it’s worked once,” Tillis said. “I got forty-five seconds left. I want somebody who has expertise in this field to explain it to me right now.”

It just so happens that Warren has such expertise in these matters because she has spent decades researching and teaching about bankruptcy, personal finance, and other economic issues.

But when Warren spoke up to answer the question, Tillis tried to slam the door in her face by calling his time at an end. That didn’t sit well with Warren, who responded by clucking at Tillis like a chicken until one of his fellow Republicans offered to give Warren 30 seconds of his time so she could provide an answer.

“I just wanted to remind my colleague that back during the COVID crisis, the financial institutions all were given free access to overdraft their accounts at the Fed,” Warren said. “It saved them literally billions of dollars because they could get free access to money when they didn’t have money in their accounts, and the government politely asked them to extend the same courtesy to their own customers — which they refused to do — and they raked in billions more in profits.”

Indeed, so when the government allowed financial institutions to overdraft their accounts without penalty, it worked to ease their own financial burdens. Credit card rate caps and cutting banks fees would help ease the financial burden of ordinary Americans who are struggling to pay off their credit card debt because of the predatory interest rates.

If it works for rich people and corporations, it will certainly work for the rest of us, since we would have money to spend on other things, including other bills, groceries, and other items that would provide an economic boost to local economies. Capping credit card rates just makes sense, even if Republicans like Tillis don’t understand it.

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