5
#000000
#FFFFFF
Economy
Sweeping Coalition Backs AOC-Sanders Bill to Cap Credit Card Interest Rates at 10%
"Working families continue to struggle with unprecedented credit card debt and deserve to see Congress take legislative action to address this growing crisis."
Feb 06, 2026
As polling continues to show US consumers are pessimistic about an economy in which they face rising costs for everything from groceries to healthcare and housing under President Donald Trump, a "historic and diverse coalition" this week called on Congress to pass a bipartisan bill that would cap credit card interest rates at 10%.
The current average credit card interest rate is nearly double that, at 19.61%, according to Bankrate. It was even higher, over 20%, when US Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) introduced the bill a year ago. Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.) lead the legislation in the House of Representatives.
Their push came in response to an unfulfilled pledge from Trump, whose campaign said in September 2024 that he "has promised to cap interest rates at 10% to provide temporary and immediate relief for hardworking Americans who are struggling to make ends meet and cannot afford hefty interest payments on top of the skyrocketing costs of mortgages, rent, groceries, and gas."
The Thursday letter to congressional leaders—signed by dozens of civil rights, consumer protection, labor, veteran, and other groups—points to that promise, as well as Trump's January social media post calling for a one-year 10% cap. It also notes that "in response to widespread Wall Street opposition to the president's recent announcement, Trump officials have begun to backtrack—instead promoting 'Trump Cards' that banks could voluntarily offer with temporary 10% interest rates."
"While the Trump administration appears to be twisting itself into knots to appease Wall Street bankers, working families continue to struggle with unprecedented credit card debt and deserve to see Congress take legislative action to address this growing crisis," the coalition stressed. "We urge your offices/committees to advance these bipartisan bills immediately and make this policy a reality."
Illustrating the need for the policy, the letter states that "Americans owe $1.21 trillion in aggregate credit card debt," "groceries now make up the majority of credit card purchases for most Americans," and "older Americans are charging everyday purchases like gas, food, healthcare expenses, and even utilities on their credit cards."
"Not only are more Americans having to lean on their credit cards to make ends meet, but more are falling behind. Today, more than 12% of credit card debt is 90 days or more past due," the letter continues. "As Americans find themselves deeper in debt, credit card companies have been raking in record profits."
The federal bill would "save families $100 billion per year and provide interest savings of $899 per person on average per year," but also "not restrict most Americans' access to credit—directly refuting common banking lobbyist talking points," the coalition explained, citing research from Vanderbilt University. "Instead, banks would absorb the rate cut through a combinationof reduced profits, reduced advertising expenses, and reduced rewards to customers with lower credit scores (who would benefit more from the rate cuts)."
It also cites a recent analysis by the letter's lead group, Protect Borrowers, showing that "credit card delinquency rates in states that President Trump won are nearly 5 percentage points higher than in other states—with states like Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama, Arkansas and South Carolina having the highest credit card delinquency rates."
When big banks charge 24% or 30% interest on credit cards, they are not engaged in the business of "making credit available." They are involved in extortion and loan sharking.Yes, we need to cap credit card interest rates at 10% and stop Wall Street from ripping off Americans.
[image or embed]
— Senator Bernie Sanders (@sanders.senate.gov) February 2, 2026 at 4:36 PM
"By providing billions of dollars in economic relief to working families, this legislation directly responds to the promises that candidate Donald Trump made to the American people last year," the groups wrote. "Recent polling has found that it is also incredibly popular by a jaw-dropping 8-to-1 margin among American voters across all political parties, spanning age, gender, race, and education level."
"It is clear: the American people support policymakers taking action to address the growing credit card crisis that is drowning millions of American families across the country in debt," the coalition concluded. "We stand ready to work with your offices to ensure that this bill becomes law and that working families get the economic relief they were promised and deserve."
Sanders and Hawley have similarly highlighted Trump's calls for the 10% rate cap in Fox News op-eds pushing for their legislation. In a Monday piece, Sanders wrote that "when Wall Street's greed and recklessness brought the economy to the verge of collapse in 2008, causing millions of Americans to lose their homes, jobs, and life savings, the taxpayers came to the rescue."
"The Federal Reserve gave these huge banks trillions of dollars in emergency loans at virtually zero interest. We bailed out the banks," he added. "Now it's time for Congress to stand with working families, end Wall Street greed, and pass legislation that caps credit card interest rates at 10%."
Keep Reading
Show Less
Experts Warn That MAHA Bait-and-Switch by RFK Jr. and Trump 'Means Big Money for Big Wellness'
"They sell consumers their own version of the grift."
Feb 05, 2026
Government watchdog Public Citizen on Thursday issued a report outlining the major conflicts of interest held by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and his allies in the Make America Healthy Again, or MAHA, movement.
In particular, the report focuses on Kennedy and three key allies: Wellness influencer Dr. Casey Means, who is President Donald Trump's nominee to be US surgeon general; her brother Calley Means, a senior adviser to Kennedy at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS); and the siblings' business partner Dr. Mark Hyman.
Public Citizen centers its report on these individuals' ties to the wellness industry, which "encompasses nutritional supplements and fitness products, and increasingly overlaps with non-science-based health beliefs."
Taken as a whole, the report says, "MAHA's influence in US healthcare means big money for Big Wellness."
Among other things, the report noted that Casey Means owns a metabolic testing company that "may have already benefited from Secretary Kennedy’s promotion of wearable health tracking devices."
The report states that Dr. Means "has also potentially violated [Federal Trade Commission] rules on influencer marketing by failing to adequately disclose sponsorship relationships in dozens of web and social media posts" that promote assorted wellness products.
"Public Citizen’s review of Dr. Means’ website, newsletter, and social media feeds found that for the almost two dozen companies from which Dr. Means reported receiving affiliate fees, Dr. Means disclosed her financial relationship inconsistently and ambiguously," the report says. "In total, she failed to disclose her financial relationship 79 out of 140 (56%) times she promoted affiliated products."
Calley Means, meanwhile, comes under scrutiny for his company TrueMed, which Public Citizen said "relies on a legally dubious business model." The report also criticizes Means for regularly promoting "dangerous and false health information," including attacks on fluoridated water and Covid-19 vaccines, and the promotion of drinking raw milk.
And Mark Hyman, states the report, "oversees a wellness empire that stands to benefit significantly from HHS policies under Kennedy."
Eileen O’Grady, a researcher in Public Citizen’s Congress Watch division, acknowledged the appeal of many MAHA influencers' sales pitch, stating that "they accurately identify that much of the US healthcare system is beholden to corporate interests like Big Pharma and the insurance industry."
However, O'Grady said that what the Means siblings and Hyman are peddling isn't much different than what they criticize in the US healthcare system.
"They sell consumers their own version of the grift," she explained. "Excessive testing, unproven and underregulated health supplements, and assurances that only their products hold the key to better health. While MAHA influencers reap the benefits of lucrative sponsorship contracts and, in some cases, political appointments, regular Americans are once again being cheated."
Keep Reading
Show Less
Sanders Probes Trump's Corporate Welfare as Walmart Hits $1 Trillion Market Cap
"Do the right thing: Get off of corporate welfare and pay all of your workers a living wage with good benefits," the democratic socialist senator implored Walmart's multibillionaire owners.
Feb 05, 2026
US Sen. Bernie Sanders on Thursday launched an investigation into how corporations including Walmart—which hit $1 trillion in market value earlier this week—benefit from tax breaks in Republicans' so-called One Big Beautiful Bill Act while many of their workers can't make ends meet.
Sanders (I-Vt.) informed Walmart president and CEO Doug McMillon and the heads of Kroger, Dollar General, and Dollar Tree in separate letters that he's probing how the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA) passed by the GOP-controlled Congress and signed by President Donald Trump last year "has negatively impacted the health and well-being of workers at large corporations... and how it has financially benefited the owners and executives of these multinational conglomerates."
"This legislation made the largest cuts to Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) in history to pay for $1 trillion in tax breaks to the top 1% and over $900 billion in tax cuts to large corporations," noted Sanders, the ranking member of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions.
"As you know, Walmart is the largest corporation in America with over $680 billion in revenue, $19.4 billion in profits, and more than 2 million workers," Sanders wrote in his letter to McMillon. "Walmart also recently became the first retailer ever to hit $1 trillion in market value. It is owned by one of the wealthiest families in America, the Walton family, which has become over $348 billion richer since 2017 and is now worth more than half a trillion dollars."
"Yet, despite the enormous wealth of the Walton family and these huge corporate profits, Walmart pays wages so low that many of its workers rely on public assistance to survive," the senator said. "At Walmart, tens of thousands of low-wage workers are forced to depend on SNAP to feed their families and Medicaid to get the healthcare they need—all paid for by US taxpayers."
"Walmart pays wages so low that many of its workers rely on public assistance to survive."
Sanders is asking the heads of the companies in his probe to "disclose how much they expect to make from the Republicans’ tax breaks and whether any of these savings will be passed along to workers."
“It has never been acceptable that incredibly profitable companies like Walmart—owned by one of the richest families on Earth—pay their workers starvation wages, forcing many of them to rely on programs like Medicaid and SNAP," Sanders wrote to McMillon. "But it is even more unacceptable when those benefits are being slashed so that corporate executives and billionaires like the Walton family can become even richer.”
Keep Reading
Show Less
'So Much for the Golden Age of America': Layoffs Hit 17-Year High Under Trump
The latest job cuts report signals "employers are less-than-optimistic about the outlook for 2026," said one analyst.
Feb 05, 2026
While President Donald Trump continues to falsely claim that the US economy is the hottest in the world, new data released Thursday shows that announced layoffs in January hit a high not seen since the Great Recession of 2009.
The new report by corporate outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas shows that that US employers announced more than 108,000 job cuts last month, more than double the nearly 50,000 job cuts that they announced one year before.
In fact, the announced job cuts were higher than any January since 2009, when the economy was in the middle of a global financial crisis.
Andy Challenger, chief revenue officer for Challenger, Gray & Christmas, said that the January 2026 job cuts were "a high number" and a signal that "employers are less-than-optimistic about the outlook for 2026."
The biggest cuts on the month came from UPS, which announced that it would be slashing 30,000 jobs, and Amazon, which announced workforce reductions of 16,000 jobs.
"So much for the 'Golden Age of America'," said Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Wis.), as he noted layoffs surging to the highest levels in 17 years.
The healthcare industry, which has been a rare bright spot in terms of job growth in recent months, announced more than 17,000 jobs cuts in January, the highest number in that sector since April 2020 when the US was in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic.
The report also showed that artificial intelligence was only responsible for 7% of layoffs announced last month, although Challenger acknowledged that it's "difficult to say how big an impact AI is having on layoffs specifically."
Additionally, the report found that US employers had announced just over 5,300 hiring plans in January, which it noted was "the lowest total for the month since Challenger began tracking hiring plans in 2009."
Sara Nelson, president of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, pointed to "the worst job numbers since the Great Recession" in a social media post. The union leader noted that the 5,300 hiring plans were "the lowest one record since the early 2000s," while adding that "layoffs are up over 100% since last January, and over 300% since January of 2024."
Mohamed El-Erian, economist at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School, described the Challenger report as "sobering," and pointed to a potentially ominous trend regarding wealth inequality in the US.
"These layoffs are occurring while GDP continues to grow at approximately 4%," he observed in a social media post, "accelerating the decoupling of employment from economic growth—a phenomenon that, if it persists, has profound economic, political, and social implications."
Melanie D'Arrigo, executive director of the Campaign for New York Health, said that the job cuts were yet more evidence that Trump and Republicans' economic policies were a failure.
"'If you give more tax cuts to corporations, those corporations will create more jobs,' is the lie politicians who are funded by corporations tell people to justify giving their corporate donors more tax cuts," she wrote. "Trump’s corporate and billionaire tax cuts create profits—not jobs."
Laura Ullrich, director of economic research in North America at the Indeed Hiring Lab, said during an interview with ABC News published on Tuesday that workers in the current economy are "hugging onto [their current job] more than they normally would" because so few companies are taking on new staff.
Keep Reading
Show Less
Most Popular