Taxpayer Watchdog Praises Congressional Efforts to Rein In Unaccountable Agency

WASHINGTON, D.C. – The House Financial Services Subcommittee on Financial Institutions will hold a hearing and markup on Wednesday March 26^th to consider a slate of bills to reform the powers wielded by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). This CFPB has long worked with startlingly broad statutory authorities and without adequate congressional oversight and control, with its funding coming from an abnormal process by which the agency essentially sets its own budget.

Taxpayers Protection Alliance (TPA) President David Williams offered the following comment in anticipation of Wednesday’s hearing:

“Congress is taking a necessary step to reassert its authority as the primary organ of policymaking in the American constitutional system. For far too long, the CFPB has operated with an improper and constitutionally dubious framework. It is an agency in dire need of reform, and only the legislature has the power to make meaningful and lasting changes. TPA applauds the Subcommittee for its work to affect this change.

“The CFPB has a dangerous combination of vast discretion and authority and little accountability. The CFPB has no direct democratic accountability, no fiscal constraints through the ordinary appropriations process, and no congressional oversight. Unwinding these errors will be a key step in furthering Congress’s and President Trump’s agenda to return lawmaking authorities from the demonstrative state back to the people’s elected representatives.

“An example of reh CFPB’s overreach is the larger participant rule. This rule would severely disrupt the digital payments industry by significantly expanding regulatory burdens. Such a rule will create onerous requirements that will negatively impact companies’ business models.

“Of course, the best option would be to abolish the CFPB entirely. It is a failed experiment that deserves to be terminated. Its authorities are largely redundant of other regulators, and whatever useful consumer-protection work it does can be done better by other agencies. Congress should legislate to make clear exactly where the CFPB’s legitimate activities should be relocated – and then shutter the agency. In lieu of that, though, the Subcommittee’s promises to do much good.”