Obama vows new direction for TARP
Posted: Monday, January 12, 2009 5:54 PM by Domenico Montanaro
From NBC's Lauren Appelbaum
President-elect Obama today promised he will fundamentally change how the second half of the TARP money will be spent, expressing dissatisfaction in the management of the program thus far, particularly with the "failure to track how the money has been spent."
"I think many of us has been disappointed with the absence of clarity and the lack of transparency," Obama told both Mexican and American journalists after meeting with Mexican President Felipe Calderon at the Mexican Cultural Institute.
The president-elect said he has already been in contact with both Senate and House leadership regarding the TARP money and acknowledged, "Main Street has not seen the effects of these efforts" from the first half of the TARP money. He promised that the second half of the money would be spent more wisely -- aimed at helping maintain the credit flow for loans to small businesses, students and homeowners.
"My commitment is that we are going to fundamentally change some of the practices in using this next phase of the program," he said. "We're going to focus on housing and foreclosures. We're going to focus on small businesses. We're going to focus on what's required to make sure that credit is flowing to consumers and businesses to create jobs in the United States and this is going to be part and parcel of a broader financial strategy that involves strengthening the regulations on Wall Street and in our financial sector, our banking sector, so that we're not seeing the kinds of systemic crises that led us into this situation in the first place."
Earlier today, Obama asked President Bush to formally request the money from Congress because the financial system "is still fragile."
"I felt that it would be irresponsible for me, with the first $350 billion already spent, to enter into the administration without any potential ammunition should there be some sort of emergency or weakening of the financial systems," Obama said.
Obama: U.S.-Mexico relationship ‘critical’
Obama praised Calderon on several accounts, including his energy policies and attempts to control drug trafficking. He pledged to work with the Calderon on both areas, calling their relationship "critical" to both the United States and Mexican economies.
"The friendship between the United States and Mexico has been strong," Obama said. "I believe it can be even stronger. And that's going to be the commitment of my administration."
Calderon said Obama's presidency will be "the beginning of an extraordinary age in the relationship between the United States and Mexico" and echoed Obama's call for a stronger friendship.
"The more secured Mexico is, the more secured the U.S. will be," Calderon said.
Obama's meeting with Calderon continued a tradition since 1980 of the incoming U.S. president meeting with the Mexican president as a symbol of their countries' relationship. Obama said they talked about border security, immigration and the current financial crisis.
The president-elect also praised Calderon for "moving his country in a direction that is unprecedented" -- in terms of Calderon's energy policies.
"And so the prospects of us working together on energy strategies across the borders is going to be critically important," Obama said.
Neither Obama nor Calderon publicly discussed the North American Free Trade Agreement.
Obama stressed during the Democratic primary that he wanted to renegotiate the treaty for tougher labor practices. During the American presidential campaign, Calderon warned several times against renegotiating NAFTA, saying that stricter rules would cause more Mexicans to try to immigrate to the United States illegally.
