NEW: Loeffler and Husband’s Company “Sought to Profit Off the Pandemic” As Loeffler Stalls Coronavirus Aid

While Georgians struggle to pay rent and mortgages, Loeffler “has taken no steps in recent months” to pass relief as ICE continues “taking advantage of the pandemic’s effect on the housing market”

ATLANTA — A bombshell new report today from Mother Jones’ David Corn revealed that unelected “political mega-donor” Senator Kelly Loeffler’s firm ICE “has sought to profit off the pandemic’s impact on the housing market and the mortgage industry” — all while Loeffler “has taken no steps in recent months” to address needed aid for homeowners.

Loeffler and her husband (and NYSE Chairman) Jeff Sprecher’s firm used the “unfortunate backdrop of COVID” to accelerate their investments in the mortgage industry — including “an $11 billion purchase of Ellie Mae, a leading provider of software for originating mortgages.”

But as Corn notes in his report, “Loeffler has been far stingier when it comes to Georgians and other Americans” than ICE has been with its investments during the crisis. While a “wave of foreclosures…could be good news for Sprecher and ICE” thanks to their growing investments in the digital mortgage market, Loeffler “didn’t answer” when asked about relief “for Georgians who, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, couldn’t pay rent and who might face eviction.”

This isn’t the first time Loeffler’s firm has landed her in hot water. In addition to her numerous conflicts of interests from the firm’s lobbying efforts, Loeffler’s time at ICE also included helping the company “establish a Cayman Islands offshore tax dodge months after the Great Recession hit” before she left the company with a “lucrative parting gift” ahead of her Senate appointment.

“At a time when Georgians are struggling to pay rent and put food on the table, Senator Kelly Loeffler and her husband’s company is trying to profit off the pandemic — all while Loeffler allows relief efforts to stall in the Senate,” said Alex Floyd, spokesman for the Democratic Party of Georgia. “Time and time again, Senator Loeffler has put herself and her interests first in Washington, and this latest report is just another example of her self-serving agenda in action.”

Read more about ICE’s efforts “to profit off the pandemic”:

Mother Jones: While Kelly Loeffler Opposed New COVID Aid, Her Husband’s Firm Sought to Profit Off the Pandemic

• In October, Atlanta magazine asked Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R-Ga.), while she was running for re-election, what should be done for Georgians who, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, couldn’t pay rent and who might face eviction. Loeffler didn’t answer the question.

• Yet while Loeffler has taken no steps in recent months to address these pressing matters, the Fortune 500 company run by her husband—in which she holds between $5 million and $25 million in stock—has sought to profit off the pandemic’s impact on the housing market and the mortgage industry.

• In recent years, ICE  has pushed to digitalize the mortgage industry. This summer, pursuing dominance in the online mortgage business, Sprecher engineered an $11 billion purchase of Ellie Mae, a leading provider of software for originating mortgages.

• At a conference in September, [ICE President Ben] Jackson pointed out that ICE’s corporate leaders thought the firm’s effort to digitalize the mortgage process would be a “10-year journey” but that the “unfortunate backdrop of COVID” accelerated the process and “gave us the conviction” to go ahead with the gargantuan Ellie Mae deal.

• While her husband was taking advantage of the pandemic’s effect on the housing market to advance ICE’s grand plan to gain control of the digital mortgage service sector, Loeffler has done little to address the housing and economic crises triggered by the coronavirus.

• In the spring, she unveiled a proposal “to restart our economy safely.”… Loeffler’s plan included no provisions regarding mortgage or rent relief or eviction moratoria.

• The issues page of her re-election campaign website contains no reference to the pandemic, the economic hardships caused by COVID-19, or the eviction and mortgage crises.

• In July, Loeffler noted her opposition to extending assistance to Americans hit hard by the coronavirus recession: “I am not seeing a big need to extend the federal unemployment insurance.”

• Mortgage forbearance provisions in the CARES Act are scheduled to end in March 2021. All this and more—including the accelerating spread of COVID-19—are likely to lead to a spike in mortgage foreclosures and evictions

• But the new “wave of foreclosures,” Motley Fool pointed out, will likely lead to a real estate buying spree. That could be good news for Sprecher and ICE, given the company’s acquisition of Ellie Mae. And ICE will continue to benefit, if the pandemic real estate market remains as strong as it has been. 

• The Loeffler campaign did not respond to a request for comment about her investment in ICE, the Ellie Mae deal, and the company’s effort to capitalize on the pandemic.

• [Loeffler’s] ongoing relationship to ICE perhaps illustrates a deeper issue. With her husband at the helm and with a large chuck of ICE shares within her personal portfolio, Loeffler stands to gain if the company succeeds in exploiting pandemic conditions to expand its hold on the digital mortgage business.

• The coronavirus crisis afforded ICE and her husband a huge opportunity, and they took an $11 billion leap with the Ellie Mae deal. So far, Loeffler has been far stingier when it comes to Georgians and other Americans for whom the pandemic means nothing but loss and misfortune.

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