Barney Frank (D-Mass.)

He said that he hopes that a Democratic president and a strong Democratic congressional majority will lead to advances in important gay rights, including but not limited to gay marriage. "Once we get out of Iraq, we'll get rid of 'don't ask, don't tell,'" he said. "There's not going to be that much of a fight over that - people are over it. Plus, it's hard to argue today that 20-year-olds freak out at the sight of a gay guy. We will also get hate-crimes legislation with transgender included, and we will get employment nondiscrimination with transgender included - if transgender people keep working for it and lobbying for it."

$700 Billion Bailout

After the Fed decided, without the aid of Congress, to loan insurance giant AIG $85 million in September 2008, Frank was dispatched by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) to determine whether the government should have the authority to continue bailing out companies.

On the night of Sept. 20, 2008, Bush Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and SEC Chairman Christopher Cox paid a visit to Capitol Hill to explain the graveness of the situation and ask for congressional approval for a wide-ranging bailout of the U.S. financial system. They told lawmakers there was no other choice but to promote the $700 bailout package. The basics of the deal were hammered out that night, but after the meeting, Frank and other key lawmakers worked around the clock and over the weekend on the details. They turned Paulson's three-page request into a 400-plus-page package that gave Paulson the ability to use government money to buy troubled securities.

After the House failed to pass the bill the first time around, Frank blasted Republicans, and President Bush in particular, for not being able to find more GOP votes. Ultimately, Congress passed the bill that created the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), 263 to 171, on Oct. 3, 2008.

In the final version of the bill, Frank was adamant about including provisions to limit pay for CEOs, and in November 2008, he warned that if public funds were misused, Congress wouldn't hesitate to withhold the second half of the $700 billion from struggling banks.

TARP Controversy

In the months following the approval of the bailout package, Frank kept his eye on the TARP, hitting Treasury over TARP's implementation. Paulson originally told lawmakers that the funds would be used to buy bad mortgages, but they were instead funneled into banks for capital infusions.

Angered by the move, Frank threatened to cut off the second half of the $700 billion if the money was not used for a foreclosure prevention program. Then-TARP Chief Neel Kashkari defended the use of the money to stabilize banks. "Imagine how many foreclosures you would have if we had allowed the system to collapse," he said.

In the 111th Congress, Frank said he planned to hold hearings with bank CEOs to investigate how they are using the money. "I am deeply disappointed that a number of financial institutions are distorting the legislation that Congress passed at the President's request to respond to the credit crisis by making funds available for increased lending," Frank said. "Any use of these funds for any purpose other than lending - for bonuses, for severance pay, for dividends, for acquisitions of other institutions, etc. - is a violation of the terms of the act."

Financial Regulation Reform

In December 2009, Frank shepherded a sweeping reform of the U.S. financial regulatory system through the House, 223 to 202. A similar bill passed the Senate and was signed by President Obama in July 2010. The bill would create a new federal agencyhoused in the Federal Reserve dedicated to consumer protection, establish a council of regulators to police the financial landscape for systemic risks, initiate oversight of the risky derivatives market and give the government power to wind down large, troubled firms whose failure would destroy the U.S. economic system.

"I think this is, frankly, of the historic dimensions of what Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson did, and what Franklin Roosevelt did," Frank said.

Affordable Housing and Fannie and Freddie

The bailout was unpopular with many, but Frank defended it as necessary. He also came under fire during the financial crisis for his previous support of housing lenders Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Frank has championed affordable housing for years, and he has praised Fannie and Freddie for their ability to make housing more affordable. He opposed attempts by the Bush administration to regulate the organizations, saying he thought it was a power play that wouldn't solve any of the actual problems. "The high cost of housing is one of the great social problems in this country. I would rank it second to the inadequacy of our health delivery system as a problem that afflicts many, many Americans," Frank said in 2003. "Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have played a very useful role in helping make housing more affordable." In 2005, Frank sponsored a bill to protect consumers against predatory mortgages, a bill that was updated in 2007.

Auto Bailout

Like with the bailout for financial institutions, Frank was at the forefront of the attempt at bailing out the auto industry at the end of 2008.

He helped write the bill that would have given a $14 billion loan to Detroit's "Big Three" automakers in the hopes of staving off bankruptcy. With support from the White House and 32 House Republicans, the House passed the bill, 237 to 170.

But the measure failed in the Senate because Republicans said it didn't guarantee the long-term viability of the companies and threw money at a problem that couldn't be fixed.

Frank then supported a plan signed on to by President Bush giving automakers a $17 billion loan loan from the TARP fund in December 2008 conditioned on them proving they could become permanently financially stable.

Hurricane Katrina

Frank was also on the front lines in New Orleans, holding hearings to investigate a shortage of affordable housing after he became Financial Services chair in 2007, more than a year and a half after Hurricane Katrina devastated the Gulf Coast.

He threatened to withhold funds to demolish public housing complexes unless the Housing and Urban Development Department guaranteed replacement of the demolished buildings with affordable alternatives.

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