Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were featured in this article about how much money they invested in Democrats including Congressman Paul Kanjorski.
Rep. Paul Kanjorski (D-Pa.) has received $65,500. Kanjorski chairs the House Financial Services Subcommittee on Capital Markets, Insurance and Government-Sponsored Enterprises, and Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae are government-sponsored enterprises, or GSEs.
Today the mortgage giants own or guarantee almost 31 million home loans worth about $5.5 trillion representing almost half of the mortgages. The twins were ordered by their federal regulator to no longer trade their shares on the New York Stock Exchange.
The Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) and its predecessor agency have overseen the operation of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac since September 2008, when they were both placed under conservatorship, a form of control similar to what is found in a bankruptcy process.
Since that time, the Treasury Department has poured $83.6 billion into Fannie Mae and $61.3 billion into Freddie Mac to cover losses on the trillions of dollars worth of mortgage-backed securities they own or guarantee.
Billions of additional losses are forecast in coming years, with the Congressional Budget Office estimating that nearly $400 billion in tax dollars will eventually be needed. The government controls the majority of the shares of each firm. Not a bad return on a $65,000 investment.
So far, taxpayers have poured $145 billion into Fannie and Freddie to keep them afloat and to buoy the overall housing market.
Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, the FHA and the Veterans Administration backed nearly 97 percent of home mortgages in the first quarter of this year, according to trade publication Inside Mortgage Finance.
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