An old interview of Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), a 2020 Democratic presidential hopeful, is inspiring supporters online, when she warned against the 2008 financial crisis a few years before it began.
Warren, then a professor at Harvard University, was interviewed on PBS’s NOW program in 2004. In it, she talks about household debt and criticizes then-Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan.
A thread was posted on Twitter on Monday with several clips from the interview, which quickly generated a lot of attention from people praising the now-presidential hopeful.
In this ’04 interview, @ewarren tried to warn us of the coming crash. Here are 4 clips.
— Tuxedo Mask (@TheLoveBel0w) May 7, 2019
“Alan Greenspan, our national economic leader, stood up for the last 4 years and told Americans ‘borrow against your house.’ What frightens me is millions of Americans have taken that advice” pic.twitter.com/qeO8xHz5jq
In this second clip, the interviewer displays the widespread attitude that led to the ’08 crash.”The houses around me are rising in price. It makes sense that I should be able to harness some of that rising real estate value”
— Tuxedo Mask (@TheLoveBel0w) May 7, 2019
Warren proceeds to give him a quick economics lesson. pic.twitter.com/jpTfUfMqPj
In the clips, Warren pushes back against the low standards for lending that were used to give mortgages to Americans that couldn’t afford them.
“What a mortgage company will lend you to buy a house and what you can afford are two very different numbers,” she says. “What they’re looking out for is to make a profit—God bless them, that’s what they’re there to do—they want to make a profit. The way they make the best possible profit is to put you in the largest possible mortgage that you, by scraping and scratching, can make just the few payments, and then they pass that mortgage off to someone else. Put it into a risk pool and move on. They’re off selling the mortgage off to the next guy.”
She also warned that the issue will become whether Americans “can they stay in the house when they get into financial trouble.”
By contrast, around the time Warren was issuing these warnings, President Donald Trump was launching a mortgage company, which folded in 2007.
The economy is something that Warren has touched on repeatedly so far in her primary campaign. But the clips seemed to cement many people’s belief that Warren should be rising in the 2020 Democratic primary polls.
My respect and admiration for this lady is growing! https://t.co/aIBMjrtgav
— Suzanne Kilfoy (@susankilfoy) May 7, 2019
https://twitter.com/BrontMacklin/status/1125752668775784448
She knew what was up then and she knows what’s up now. https://t.co/6RzajZsfL1
— sherean (@sherean) May 7, 2019
Wow, @ewarren you keep looking better and better. Seems you’ll put Americans 1st. https://t.co/ax01NeFZkv
— Renée Donahey (@renaitre8) May 7, 2019
The more i see regarding @ewarren the more i am convinced this should be the next POTUS https://t.co/oA8xgTm4zs
— Pat (@Return_of_the_p) May 7, 2019
The more I find out about Elizabeth Warren, the more impressed I get. https://t.co/9i5XHI1YH7
— Hutaff Kent (@LucasHaskins) May 7, 2019
Oh man, how can anyone this smart expect to be elected president? Read the whole thread. https://t.co/54RwiNcVK6
— Andrew Cockburn (@andrewmcockburn) May 7, 2019
Warren has been one of the few 2020 Democratic hopefuls who has pushed out detailed policy positions early in the primary cycle.
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- Elizabeth Warren hopes policy will set her apart in 2020
- Warren’s plan to cancel student debt stimulates the bad-take economy
