Bush’s ownership society eased lending to minorities through public-private partnerships

Evidence

The road to the housing crisis in black America was paved with good intentions, sort of. In June of 2002 President George W. Bush made his way to the pulpit of a quaint African Methodist Episcopal church in Atlanta. “Now, we’ve got a problem here in America that we have to address,” he told the crowd. Too many American families, too many minorities do not own a home. There is a home ownership gap in America. The difference between Anglo American and African American and Hispanic home ownership is too big. And we’ve got to focus the attention of this nation to address this. … Bush hoped to achieve his goal through a vast network of public-private partnerships. He announced that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac would “increase their commitment to minority markets by more than $440 billion.” Freddie Mac would make it possible for “consumers with poor credit…to get a mortgage with an interest rate that automatically goes down after a period of consistent payments”; Fannie Mae would partner with 100 faith-based organizations to improve homeownership education, and organizations like the Enterprise Foundation would help rebuild and rehabilitate urban neighborhoods in partnership with local community groups. — Eddie S. Glaude Jr., Democracy in Black, 38

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to rhetoric of inclusion that Glaude later argues functions as cover for structural failure (Obama-era inclusion theme).
• QUESTION: The 5.5 million target and $440 billion commitment vs. later collapse — worth chasing whether predatory subprime targeting was a deliberate design choice.