Republican Sen. Pat Toomey slammed "Elizabeth Warren's nonsense" over a provision in the government spending bill that rolls back a financial regulation aimed at Wall Street banks.
"I hope you're not going to fall for Elizabeth Warren's nonsense," said Toomey on WPHT radio Friday.
At issue is the swaps rule, a provision of the 2010 Dodd-Frank law which requires banks to have certain derivatives in units outside the government's safety net. The House passed the 1.1 trillion spending bill with the provision to roll back the rule Thursday evening. The Senate must now consider the bill, which Democratic Senator Warren has vehemently opposed.
The Pennsylvania Republican suggested Warren's outrage came out of personal ambition, calling it "absolute nonsense."
"This is Elizabeth Warren ginning up the leftwing of the Democratic Party who are professional haters of business. This is absolute nonsense," Toomey said.
"There is a tiny provision in Dodd-Frank that forces banks do something that is counter productive, it forces, in fact it increases taxpayer risk because it forces them to do some of their risk management outside the bank in a separate subsidiary where they can't manage their risk as well. Nobody thinks this is a good idea. No regulators do, nobody who understands banking does, nobody who understands risk management. So all it does is it says banks can conduct their ordinary risk management processes within the institution itself."
"Elizabeth Warren sees this as an opportunity to just gin up the leftwing. Let's not go for that."