BY DANIEL MORITZ-RABSON ON 4/10/19 AT 4:08 PM EDT
SNIPPET:
Michigan Representative Rashida Tlaib said that bank executives were "greenwashing" their role in funding climate change on Wednesday.
The chief executives of Bank of America, BNY Mellon, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase, Morgan Stanley and State Street appeared together in front of Congress for the first time in 10 years to face questions from the House Committee on Financial Services. At the hearing, which discussed changes large banks had made since the financial collapse of 2008, Tlaib asked the CEOs if they would change bank behavior to address climate change.
The bank leaders said they had and continue to take action on climate change, leading Tlaib to respond: "Don't say that you're clean and sustainable financing because your companies' words are not consistent with your actions. I would call this gaslighting."
"But for the sake of this hearing, I'll say that you are greenwashing your own track record and duping the American people into believing that you are helping address climate change. On the record, will any of your banks make a commitment to phase out your investments in fossil fuels and dirty energy?"
Tlaib earlier told JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon that, "your bank alone has provided more than $195 billion in fossil fuel lending and underwriting over the past three years since signing of the Paris Climate agreement, making your bank the number funder of fossil fuels in the world."
She also said that
😈 Citigroup and 😈 Bank of America have provided over $100 billion each in fossil fuel funding in the last three years, making them, respectively, the third and fourth largest funders of 🦕🦖 fossil ☠️ fuels.
read more:
https://www.newsweek.com/rashida-tlaib-banks-gaslighting-americans-funding-fossil-fuels-1391824