In a timely follow-up to my last post, Firedoglake reports that Blanche Lincoln will not return the donations her campaign received from Goldman Sachs despite the civil fraud lawsuit now pending against Goldman (and despite her earlier statement that, as of 1/1/09, she was not accepting money from non-Arkansas financial institutions that received bailout money).
However, Blanche Lincoln, who also has been hammered by her opponent for ties to Wall Street, won’t join [Mark] Kirk. She simply said “No” when asked if she would return Goldman contributions at a press event today. And she added, “I don’t think I’ve accepted contributions disproportionately from any group.”
Lincoln may feel her turn on derivatives, which probably won’t even hit the final bill, will inoculate her from criticism. I don’t think her primary opponent Bill Halter agrees.
UPDATE: Bill Halter’s communications director, Laura Chapin, responds:
Arkansans need no bigger example of the fact that Washington is broken than Sen. Lincoln’s refusal to return contributions from Goldman Sachs, a Wall Street firm that she voted to bail out and is now under federal indictment for fraud.
No, they’re not letting up.
Well, it seems Ms. Lincoln either shares my theory that “financial reform” isn’t really an issue with Arkansas voters, and now she wants to put that theory to the test. My question, though, is when it comes time to spin this as being strongly anti-bailout, what radio stations will she run her ad on?