ABA Strongly Opposed to Gooden-Welch Credit Card Legislation

“We strongly oppose the credit card legislation introduced by Representatives Welch and Gooden today. Representative Welch took the side of the world’s largest retailers, Walmart and Amazon, in an effort to boost their profits and give them even more power to put local Vermont retailers out of business. This is a boon for the big boxes and a loss for Main Street. The bill will also harm tourism by eliminating the credit card rewards that make it possible for so many people to travel, stay, and spend in the Green Mountain state.

“We’re also disappointed and surprised that Representative Gooden wants to put the Federal Reserve in charge of the intricacies of how Americans’ credit card transactions are processed, an affront to the free-market system and a threat to the privacy and data security of every cardholder and merchant. Senator Durbin has been looking for a Republican to carry his government intervention agenda for a decade, and Representative Gooden answered the call today.

“Both Representatives Welch and Gooden chose big retailers over the strongly-stated opposition of community financial institutions and their customers.  Like the Durbin Amendment on debit cards, consumers will see higher costs, less access, and less competition – all on behalf of publicly traded retailers with profit margins many times that of community banks. We urge every member of Congress to oppose this deeply flawed and harmful legislation.”