Trump
Taps Fifth Third Bank Lawyer
For FDIC Amid OCC Scams on CRA
& Sanctions, CFPB
By Matthew R. Lee
NEW YORK,
December 1 – Amid the scandal
of the Office of the
Comptroller of the Currency covering
up Sterling Bank's unreliable
Community Reinvestment Act
data (see below) by
withholding most of 400 pages
released to Inner City Press
under the Freedom of
Information (and now trying to
strong-arm Inner City Press
into scaling back its
request), the FDIC is primed
to take as its leader the
lawyer of Fifth Third Bank,
Jelena McWilliams. When Fair
Finance Watch asked Fifth
Third for its Home Mortgage
Disclosure Act data, Fifth
Third insisted on only giving
the data in paper form, unlike
nearly all other banks which
gave it electronically. The
effect was to make it
impossible to analyze patterns
in the data, the purpose of
the HMDA law. Meanwhile the
Consumer Financial Protection
Bureau has become a
battlefield. In order to run
in Ohio, Richard Cordray
stepped down at the head of
the CFPB, naming as his
successor Leandra English.
Hours later, Trump issued a
statement that "he is
designating Director of the
Office of Management and
Budget (OMB) Mick Mulvaney as
Acting Director of the
Consumer Financial Protection
Bureau (CFPB)." On November 25
the White House held a
background press call, on
which opposition to the naming
of Mulvaney was characterized
coming from "blog-posts."
Still, the Senior
Administration Officials were
asked if they plan to have
Leandra English removed from
the premises. No, was the
answer: she should show up at
the Deputy. But have they
spoken with Ms English? No,
was the answer. On
Sunday English filed suit
against Mulvany "in his
capacity as the person
claiming to be the acting
director of the CFPB." But a
preliminary injunction has
been denied. Watch this site.
After non-response by the OCC
even has it promises
merger approvals to banks with
Needs to Improve CRA ratings
and allows Bank of Tokyo -
Mitsubishi to skirt North
Korea sanctions review by fast
approving applications for
which effective public notice
was never provided (ICP scoop
on notice here),
now ICP and CRC have filed
suit, stating "No formal
response was ever received
from the OCC in response to
Plaintiffs’ FOIA Request. To
date, the OCC has not
disclosed any records
responsive to Plaintiffs’ FOIA
Request nor has sent any
correspondence to Plaintiffs
informing
them of the OCC’s need for an
extension of time to process
the FOIA Request. As of
November 10, 2017, Plaintiffs’
FOIA Request was listed as 'In
Process' on the OCC’s FOIA
request portal... Defendant
has far exceeded the
20-working day statutory time
limit for the processing of
FOIA requests, as required by
5 U.S.C. § 552(a)(6)(A).
12. Plaintiffs have a
statutory right to the records
sought in its requests...
WHEREFORE, Plaintiff prays for
relief as follows: A. Order
Defendant to conduct a
reasonable search for all
records responsive to
Plaintiffs’ FOIA Request, and
to immediately disclose all
records or portions of records
responsive to the FOIA Request
in their entirety that are
non- exempt; B. Issue a
declaratory judgment that
Plaintiffs are entitled to
disclosure of the records
responsive to Plaintiffs’ FOIA
Request; C. Enjoin Defendant
from continuing to withhold
responsive, non-exempt records
or portions of records from
Plaintiffs; D. Provide for
expeditious proceedings of
this action... Dated: November
17, 2017 By: s/ James H.
Kaster." Watch this site. As
to Otting, beyond his gaming
of the CRA system, another
problem has arisen: Otting
misrepresented his resume on
education. He listed a degree
on his resume from the "School
of Credit and Financial
Management at Dartmouth
College." It's a fraud.
"Joseph Otting is not a
Dartmouth graduate," Dartmouth
spokeswoman Diana Lawrence
said. "Dartmouth does not have
a school of credit and
financial management." In
turns out the school is a
four-week program spread over
two years, which rented
space from Dartmouth. It's not
only Sterling's CRA data is an
unreliable.
While at OneWest, as reported
by Inner City Press in 2015,
Otting was best know for
trying to get his own
employees, fundees and
investors to submit comments
to the OCC to support
OneWest's purchase by
CIT. Click here.
Otting wrote: From: Otting,
Joseph M [at] owb.com
Sent: Wednesday, January 07,
2015 5:00 PM
Cc: Haas, Alesia Jeanne; Tran,
Cindy; Kim, Glenn
Subject: Support For OneWest
Bank
Dear Friends,
We were excited to announce on
July 21, 2014, that IMB HoldCo
LLC, the parent company of
OneWest Bank entered into a
merger agreement with CIT
Group Inc. As part of the
applications for regulatory
approval of the transaction,
our regulators are interested
in the perspectives of the
public. We are writing you to
seek your support of the Bank
and pending merger. This
merger, if approved, would
create the largest bank
headquartered in Southern
California with a full suite
of banking products and
services, which will allow us
to better serve our customers.
We would retain and grow jobs
and are committed to
continuing and expanding our
efforts to serve the economic
and development needs of our
community. I would like to ask
you to take a moment to click
on the link below and submit a
letter of support adding any
of your own words or thoughts.
Please submit your letter by
clicking here, or by visiting
our website at
www.OneWestBank.com/merger-support
(if the link isn't clickable
or part of the link is cut
off, please copy and paste the
entire URL into your browser's
address bar and press Enter)
Thank you for your
support. Best wishes for
a successful 2015 and please
call on me if I can ever be of
assistance.
Joseph M. Otting
President and CEO
OneWest Bank N.A.
888 East Walnut Street
Pasadena, CA 91101
Inner City
Press and the California
Reinvestment Coalition, both
members of the National
Community Reinvestment
Coalition (NCRC) will have
more on this.
***
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