Hearing on the Jubilee Act for Responsible Lending

Hearing on the Jubilee Act for Responsible Lending, Today, Nov. 8 @ 10 a.m.!

The hearing will take place on Thursday, Nov. 8, at 10 a.m. in Rayburn House Office Building, Room 2128 on Capitol Hill. If you are in Washington, D.C. or nearby, you are welcome to attend. For those outside of D.C. or if you can't get away from work, watch/listen to it online via live webcast! Go directly to the Financial Services Committee hearing page online at 10 a.m. today and join in!

Led by Rep. Barney Frank, Rep. Spencer Bachus, and Rep. Maxine Waters (and thanks in no small part due to the grassroots pressure created by the Cancel Debt Fast and Rev. David Duncombe's ministry), the House Financial Services Committee has scheduled a legislative hearing on the Jubilee Act for Expanded Debt Cancellation and Responsible Lending (HR 2634).
Among the expected witnesses are:

Neil Watkins, National Coordinator, Jubilee USA Network
Emira Woods, Foreign Policy In Focus Co-Director, Institute for Policy Studies
Gerry Flood, Counselor, Office of International Justice & Peace-U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops
Aldo Caliari, Coordinator, Bretton Woods Project, Center of Concern

The hearing will consider provisions of the Jubilee Act (HR 2364, S 2166), which currently has 86 cosponsors in the House and 11 in the Senate. The Jubilee Act would:

Cancel the debts of up to 26 additional nations not currently eligible for debt cancellation, provided that they demonstrate plans to spend the money wisely on poverty reduction;

Cut harmful requirements that are delaying access to life-saving debt relief for countries like HaitiLiberia; and

Call on U.S. Treasury Secretary to address the challenges presented by so-called vulture funds, one of which recently extracted $15 million from impoverished Zambia; and

Establish policies for responsible lending to avoid odious and unjust debt accumulation in the future.

This hearing is an important first step as we work towards passage of this important legislation.
Be sure to visit the Jubilee USA website a few hours after the hearing, where we'll post transcripts of the speeches from the scheduled witnesses.

Thanks for all the work you do for Jubilee justice!