Where Did Taxpayer Money Go? Panel Slams Treasury

Elizabeth Warren, the Harvard Law professor who chairs the Congressional panel overseeing how the Treasury Department spends Troubled Assets Relief Program (TARP) money.

(Charles Dharapak/AP Photo)

TARP Oversight Issues

Strategy Behind Who Receives TARP Money: Though TARP originally was conceived as a bank rescue plan, the dozens of companies that have received preliminary or full approval for TARP funds include the credit card company American Express and insurance giant AIG.

The panel said that Treasury should "clearly identify the types of institutions it believes fall under the purview" of the rescue package.

"The question is how the infusion of billions of dollars to an insurance conglomerate or a credit card company advances both the goal of financial stability and the well-being of taxpayers, including homeowners threatened by foreclosure, people losing their jobs and families unable to pay their credit cards," the report said.

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Unanswered Questions: Of the 44 questions the panel presented earlier to the Treasury Department, the department responded to 19. The report suggests that some of the answers the Treasury provided were inadequate.

"While Treasury's letter provided responses to some of the panel's questions and shed some light on Treasury's decision-making process, it did not provide complete answers to several of the questions and failed to address some of the questions at all," the report said.

"The panel is concerned that Treasury's initial response to our questions is not comprehensive and seems largely derived from earlier Treasury public statements," it said.

The Origins of the Credit Crisis: The panel said that the Treasury should "provide an analysis of the origins of the credit crisis and the factors that exacerbated it."

"Only then," the report said, "will Congress be able to determine the appropriate legislative responses."