As the Trump administration prepared to take power in Washington, D.C., the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) wasted no time. In the two months leading up to the inauguration, the bureau sued some of the biggest Fortune 500 companies: Capital One, Experian, Walmart, JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, and Wells Fargo, among others, alleging that they cheated, deceived, or failed to protect American consumers.
The CFPB has vigorously pursued a mission to return billions of dollars to consumers from junk fees and fraud. Since the bureau’s founding in 2011, it has provided over $21 billion in consumer relief, including monetary compensation and canceled debts, to an estimated 205 million consumers and consumer accounts.
However, not everyone is a fan of the CFPB’s work.
“Delete CFPB,” wrote Elon Musk on X in late November. “There are too many duplicative regulatory agencies.” While a billionaire complaining about the CFPB is nothing new, Musk is set to lead the new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), tasked with restructuring the federal government by reducing expenditures and bureaucracy.
Delete CFPB. There are too many duplicative regulatory agencies.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 27, 2024
While there is an alphabet soup’s worth of other Federal agencies that oversee the nation’s financial infrastructure—the Office of Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), the Federal Reserve Board (FRB), the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), and the National Credit Union Administration (NCUA)—the CFPB is the only agency dedicated to purely serving the interests of consumer finances.
What is the CFPB? How does it protect American consumers?
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is one of the youngest federal agencies, founded in 2011. According to the bureau’s mission statement, it implements and enforces consumer financial law and ensures that markets for consumer financial products are fair, transparent, and competitive. It provides resources for Americans to make informed financial decisions, and lets people file complaints if they feel a company is violating the law.
The bureau was established as part of the Dodd-Frank Act, which reformed the American financial sector in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis and the Great Recession. Elizabeth Warren was one of the architects of the CFPB, before she was elected U.S. senator for the state of Massachusetts. Since then, Warren has been one of its staunchest supporters.
The CFPB is funded by the Federal Reserve—not by Congress—and is led by a single director who is nominated by the president and confirmed by the Senate. The current director is Rohit Chopra. While the Senate unanimously confirmed him in 2018 to serve on the Federal Trade Commission, his nomination to the CFPB required a tie-breaking vote by Vice President Kamala Harris.
The CFPB has been a target since before the first Trump administration
The CFPB has been the target of threats from politicians since its inception. During his first presidential campaign and term, Donald Trump promised to make changes to the Dodd-Frank Act and work with Congressional Republicans to get rid of the CFPB altogether.
While officials from the bureau dialed back their regulatory enforcement activities during the first Trump administration, the rules governing the agency—including the Dodd-Frank Act’s unfair, deceptive, or abusive acts or practices prohibition—remained untouched.
Today, opponents say the CFPB fails to protect all consumers, undermines economic freedom, and exists without needed Congressional oversight.
During the most recent presidential campaign, Project 2025, a controversial blueprint for the next republican presidency, called for the abolishment of the CFPB. “The CFPB is a highly politicized, damaging, and utterly unaccountable federal agency. It is unconstitutional,” wrote the authors of Project 2025.
Mark Zuckerberg and Marc Andreessen have also expressed grievances about the agency in separate appearances on Joe Rogan’s podcast, The Joe Rogan Experience. Both billionaires tied the agency to Warren, with Andreesen saying it does whatever Warren wants.
Andreesen said the bureau “terrorizes financial institutions” and prevents new startups and competition that want to compete with the big banks. He also claims the CFPB “debanks” pro-Trump individuals and insulates the left.
Could changes at the CFPB affect you?
Changes at the CFPB could result in the rollback of recently implemented rules and fines. They could enable businesses in the future to mislead consumers without much consequence, says Christine Chen Zinner, senior policy counsel at Americans for Financial Reform.
Zinner cites a recent ruling that took $49 billion in medical debt off of more than 15 million Americans’ credit reports as one example of consumer-friendly measures Republicans potentially want to reverse.
Another is the CFPB’s recent ruling to close an overdraft fee loophole. It is expected to save consumers up to $5 billion annually, or more than $200 per household. This is on top of over $430 million ordered to be redressed to consumers from wrongful overdraft fees at banks like Wells Fargo and Navy Federal Credit Union.
“(The CFPB) stands up for everyday people against some pretty powerful interests like Wall Street banks, predatory lenders, and other financial services companies that really have tried to rip everyday people off some of the things that they’ve obtained for us,” Zinner says.
Recent CFPB rules also lowered the average credit card late fees from $32 to $8, which translates to an average savings of $220 per year for 45 million people.
“If you do have a business who is profiting from abusive practices or predatory practices, and they’re making their profits that way, it’s really not fair to the businesses who are following the rules and who are profiting from truly being a good product and adding value,” Zinner says.
Opponents of the CFPB say potential changes will help taxpayer dollars be spent more appropriately. The CFPB receives about over $700 million in funding each year.
