Geithner Gets Official Invite to Testify on AIG
Here’s the letter from Rep. Edolphus Towns (D-N.Y.), chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, asking Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner to testify later this month on the more than $60 billion filtered to Goldman Sachs and other Wall Street giants as part of the AIG bailout. Bloomberg News reported last week that the New York Federal Reserve — headed by Geithner at the time — had asked AIG not to disclose those payments publicly, advice that AIG ultimately ignored.
“„Among the issues you should be prepared to address are the following:
- The Federal intervention at AIG, including your role in that intervention.
- The decision to compensate AIG’s credit default counterparties at par.
- The role of the New York Federal Reserve Bank and other Federal agencies in AIG’s failure to disclose to the public the counterparty payments.
There are, of course, other questions to ask. Like why the New York Fed is now lying about its role in trying to shield the payments from the public. And why the lawyer chosen to steer the AIG bailout was plucked from the team representing JPMorgan Chase.
Towns’ letter takes all the wind out of the argument, floated yesterday by Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.), that targeting Geithner — but not the Bush-era Treasury officials also involved – amounts to a Republican-driven witch hunt against the Obama administration.
The oversight hearing is scheduled for Jan. 27.
