Warren: People Think System is 'Rigged Against Them,' and 'They're Right'

Massachusetts Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren delivered a populist speech aimed at corporate greed to an enthusiastic audience at the Democratic National Convention tonight.

“People feel like the system is rigged against them, and here is the painful part, they’re right,” she said. “The system is rigged. Look around. Oil companies guzzle down the billions in profits. Billionaires pay a lower tax rate than their secretaries, and Wall Street CEOs, the same ones the direct our economy and destroyed millions of jobs still strut around Congress, no shame, demanding favors, and acting like we should thank them.”

Digging at former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, Warren talked about meeting “people who bust their tails every day, and not one of them, not one, stashes their money in the Cayman Islands to avoid paying their fair share of taxes.”

“These folks don’t resent that somebody else made more money. We are Americans. We celebrate success. We just don’t want the game to be rigged.”

President Obama, she said, understands “the economy doesn’t grow from the top down but from the middle-class out and the bottom up.”

Warren, who established the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, is trying to unseat Sen. Scott Brown (R-Mass.), but steered clear of directly attacking her moderate challenger.

“The Republican vision is clear — ‘I got mine. The rest of you are on your own.’ Republicans say they don’t believe in government. Sure, they do. They believe in government to help themselves and their powerful friends,” she said.

“After all, Mitt Romney is the guy who said corporations are people. No, Governor Romney, corporations are not people. People have hearts. They have kids. They get jobs. They get sick. They cry, they dance. They live, they love, and they die, and that matters. That matters.”