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Coakley meeting with Obama today

E-mail|Link|Comments () October 9, 2009 03:28 PM

AP photo

Martha Coakley flanked by other attorneys general, Andrew Cuomo of New York (left) and Roy Cooper of North Carolina at the White House today.

By Matt Viser and Jonathan Saltzman, Globe Staff

Attorney General Martha Coakley is meeting with President Obama this afternoon in Washington, a key meeting that, while unrelated to her US Senate candidacy, could showcase her as a national player.

The president asked her to come to discuss financial regulatory reforms that Obama is pursuing. She is joined by three other attorneys general, Andrew Cuomo of New York; Lisa Madigan of Illinois; and Roy Cooper of North Carolina.

The meeting will also include Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and economic adviser Lawrence H. Summers.

Coakley is the perceived front-running in the Democratic primary for US Senate, where she is up against US Representative Michael Capuano, City Year cofounder Alan Khazei, and Celtics co-owner Stephen Pagliuca.

"It's clear we're being invited as AGs," Coakley said in a telephone interview after arriving in Washington. "We're in the lead in Massachusetts, with suits like Freemont and our settlement with Goldman Sachs. Other states who are aggressive on this look to Massachusetts on this."

Coakley said she and three other state attorneys general invited to the White House were among a group of prosecutors who had cracked down on investment banks and mortgage companies that she said had contributed to the financial crisis.

In June, Fremont Investment & Loan Co., once one of the state’s largest subprime mortgage lenders, agreed to pay $10 million to settle charges that it offered predatory loans in low-income neighborhoods across Massachusetts.

The state had sued Fremont, alleging that its loans included terms, such as 100 percent financing, "no documentation borrowing," that often resulted in borrowers defaulting and facing foreclosure.

Also this year, Coakley reached a $60 million agreement with Wall Street giant Goldman Sachs Group to reduce the size of subprime loans for some 700 Massachusetts homeowners by up to 35 percent.

Coakley said predatory lending by financial institutions reflected a "Wild West" atmosphere in the marketplace during the Bush administration and underscored the need for a federal consumer financial protection agency.

"We're not trying to limit what they can sell," she said of financial institutions. "We just want to make sure they're fair and accurate in their descriptions."

Coakley, 56, who is widely considered the frontrunner in the compressed Democratic primary race to succeed the late Senator Kennedy, said she did not view her invitation to the White House as an endorsement of her candidacy by Obama.

"I'm clearly invited as attorney general and for the work I've done as attorney general, but this is a huge issue for people in this country," Coakley said.

Asked about Obama being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, Coakley said she was "a little surprised." But she said she viewed the award as a testament to a collaborative approach she said Obama has made in foreign affairs and to his policy goals.