Al Franken: “I would like to discuss the votes that we have taken over the last few days. Tuesday, along with 54 of my colleagues, I…”

“I would like to discuss the votes that we have taken over the last few days. Tuesday, along with 54 of my colleagues, I voted in support of the INVEST In America Act as a substitute for H.R. 3606. In fact, I was an original cosponsor of the INVEST In America Act because it strikes the right balance between promoting entrepreneurship and protecting investors. But before I go into a long explanation, I would like to begin with a story. Bemidji is a town of about 14,000 people in northern Minnesota and might not be the first place you would think of as being a hotbed for start-up investment. But you would be wrong. Three entrepreneurs there, Tina, Bud and Tim, harnessed the power of the Internet and the crowd-sourcing website Kickstarter to raise over $17,000. With that money, they are opening a micro-brewery--the Bemidji Brewing Company. Two hundred and fifty individuals contributed to their efforts--about half of them were friends and family, and half of them were strangers. Many contributors gave $20--and in return, Bemidji Brewing is sending them a bottle opener and decal, and will carve their name into the walls of the future brewery. Bemidji Brewing hopes to have batches out to local establishments this summer. This is an amazing story. And there are thousands of others just like it. I support efforts to promote these types of crowd-sourced endeavors. But we don't need H.R. 3606 to produce more success stories like Bemidji Brewing.…”