Consumer watchdog agency gets teeth back under Biden
NEW YORK — The nation’s consumer watchdog is signaling a more aggressive approach toward the financial services sectors after a few years of being on a tight leash.
Under President Joe Biden, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has rescinded or scaled back a number of policies put in place by the Trump administration. And the bureau is staffing up in anticipation of taking a more active role in regulation and enforcement, as it did during the Obama administration.
This is all being done without the CFPB having a permanent director, an important position since the bureau’s authority comes from the director who is answerable only to the president. Dave Uejio, a longtime career employee of the bureau, has been the bureau’s acting director since Trump’s appointee Kathy Kraninger resigned the day Biden was sworn into office.
Despite holding a caregiver or placeholder position, Uejio’s has been quite active in the role.
In April, the bureau broadened the scope for what it considers to be abusive behavior by providers of financial services or products to consumers. Under Kraninger, the bureau adopted a narrower definition that, among other things, made monetary penalties less likely. The change will likely result in more enforcement actions and larger fines against the financial services industry, experts said.
Created in 2011, the CFPB was supposed to be a nonpartisan advocate for consumers and borrowers after the Great Recession; instead, the bureau has often been caught in the middle of the ideological war between Democrats and Republicans’ views on how to run government.
Under the Trump administration, enforcement actions and fines dropped off significantly compared to when the bureau was controlled by Richard Cordray, President Barack Obama’s appointee to the bureau who left in November 2017. The bureau’s own data shows the CFPB collecting $650 million in fines or penalties per year under Trump appointees’ control compared to $1.84 billion on average collected annually under the Obama administration.
The bureau also rescinded several measures put into place by the Trump administration during the early days of the coronavirus pandemic. Many of these directives were designed to give banks flexibility — particularly when it came to record-keeping as the entire industry shifted to working remotely.
But consumer advocates argue the banking industry has had a full year to adjust and consumers deserve accurate records.
The bureau has also extended its mission in ways previously not seen.
Using its authority to go after debt collectors, the CFPB moved last month to protect tenants behind on rent due to the pandemic from eviction. The Centers for Disease Control last year put into effect an eviction moratorium, but the CDC had no statutory authority itself to enforce its own rule.
So, the bureau used its authority to force any agents acting on behalf of landlords, typically law firms hired to collect back rent, to give tenants their rights under the CDC’s rule and to make sure struggling tenants got assistance.
The CFPB had never held any authority over renters or rent collection previously, and the change was welcomed by poverty and consumer advocates.
The banking industry has been critical of the more aggressive posture of the bureau, partly because the changes are happening under a temporary director.
“If he’s going to make these changes and be in this role for an extended period of time, he should appear in front of Congress as is statutorily required,” said Richard Hunt, president and CEO of the Consumer Bankers Association, a trade group for the larger retail banks.