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34 CHRIS CHRISTIE WANTS PARTIES TO FIND COMMON GROUND ON HOUSING POLICY e only way to fix the country's housing problem is for Republicans and Democrats to sit in a room together and talk about housing policy until they agree, according to one presiden- tial hopeful at the Bipartisan Policy Center/J. Ronald Terwilliger New Hampshire Housing Summit. Republican New Jersey Governor Chris Christie was asked about other issues despite the fact that the event was a housing summit—but he never strayed too far from housing during a discussion on stage with Carl Cameron of Fox News and a Q and A session with the audi- ence. Other presidential candidates such as Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina), former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee, and New York Governor George Pataki, were on hand to address the housing crisis. Cameron asked Christie what he would do in the first 100 days of his presidency to put the country on a bipartisan path to close the gap so people who are trapped in renting and want to own a home can do so. Christie responded that the way to do it is to bring all the Republicans and Democrats from Congress and put them together and ask each side what it can live with and to stay together until they come up with a list of items both sides agree on. And as president, he said, he would support the list the two sides agree on. "at's the way you're going to fix it," Chris- tie said. "Unfortunately what happens most of the time now is, this president just meets with Democrats, the previous president just meets with Republicans, of whoever's in the majority, and there's no outreach to everyone else. I've got to worry about keeping a Republican caucus in line, and I've got to try to get a Democratic majority to come and help me with things. I've been doing this for six years. For everybody else, it's like splitting the atom. For me, it's what I do every day." e housing crisis has been referred to as a "silent" crisis by former HUD Secretary Henry Cisneros and former Senator Scott Brown, both of whom spoke at Friday's event, because no one wants to talk about it. But when it comes to is- sues like income inequality, low homeownership rates, and people losing their homes to foreclo- sure, why is it not talked about more often in the news and elsewhere? "I think that the reason you don't have a lot of discussion about it is because it's not the sexi- est issue in the world to talk about, and it kind of depresses me," Christie said. "Right? When you hear folks talk about the enormous chal- lenge it creates to a family to either be homeless or be on the verge of homeless and the tension and pressure it creates, people don't make the correlation to health even though they should, and they don't make the correlation to education even though they should. We don't make that correlation because it's one of those really ugly undersides of American society that we don't want to talk about." Despite the fact that no one seems to want to talk about the housing crisis, however, Christie stated, "Housing is one of those things that we have to talk about. at's why I came up here today," adding that he has seen the effect of the housing crisis in his state of New Jersey and the slow rate of recovery. "We need to fix it," he said. S&P: GOVERNMENT'S CONTROL OF FANNIE MAE AND FREDDIE MAC WON'T CHANGE e U.S. government is unlikely to change its current control over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in spite of efforts from lawmakers and various lawsuits filed by GSE shareholders against the government, according to Standard and Poor's analyst Nikola G. Swann and his team. Swann and his team wrote in a report to clients that the impasse among lawmakers as to the future of the GSEs, the fact that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have been profitable since 2012, and the near recovery of most housing markets have made the privatization of the GSEs or any type of reform unlikely for the foreseeable future. at could change if either party sweeps both the presidency and Congress in 2016; if the housing market suffers another collapse akin to the one experienced in 2008; or if any of the lawsuits filed by GSE investors Pershing Square or Fairholme Funds over the sweeping of GSE profits into Treasury are successful, according to Swann. "e U.S. Treasury's decision to modify, in 2012, the Preferred Stock Purchase Agreements (PSPAs) governing the terms of its financial support to Fannie and Freddie led to the filing of a number of lawsuits against the government by private-sector shareholders of these two GREs," Swann said. "e chief point of contention is the 'full income sweep,' which replaced a set 10 percent dividend payment on Treasury's preferred shares with an indefinite, quarterly sweep of every dollar of profit each firm earns." e Treasury responded that it changed the terms of the bailout agreement in 2012 and began sweeping all GSE profits into Treasury "to avoid Fannie or Freddie having to borrow from the Treasury to pay the set dividend, and noted that taxpayers continue to bear risks emanating from these entities, implying that this deserves compensation." Swann contends that if the plaintiffs were to be awarded substantial damages in any of the lawsuits, it would draw significant political attention. In an extreme case, the administration might decide to distance itself from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and privatize them should the courts rule that the profit sweep is illegal. With no timetable set for a settlement on any of the lawsuits, however, that could take some time. Even then, Swann said, the government is likely to continue backing existing Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac loans. Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tennessee) has been at the forefront of the push for GSE reform, but a bill he introduced in 2013 has stalled. Both parties are generally in agreement that the conservatorship needs to end, but they cannot agree on what, if anything, should replace Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Of the 80,500 foreclosure starts nationwide during August 2015, 57 percent of them were repeat foreclosures—the highest share of repeat foreclosures on record, according to Black Knight Financial Services. KNOW THIS

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