SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
"Dodd-Frank is quite specific: It provides its own succession planning. There is no vacancy for President Trump to fill," said Sen. Elizabeth Warren in an interview. (Photo: The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights/Twitter)
Protesters Slam Trump Attempt to 'Vaporize' CFPB as Agency Power Struggle Begins
Barney Frank, co-author of legislation that created the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, said the law is "clearly" not on Trump's side
Nov 27, 2017
Already facing a lawsuit charging that his appointment to head the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) is "unlawful," White House budget director Mick Mulvaney was confronted with outraged protests on Monday as he arrived at CFPB headquarters for his first day as "acting director" of the agency--a title also claimed by Leandra English, the CFPB's deputy director.
"This is about whose side President Trump is on--big banks, or working families. So far in his administration, he has chosen the big banks time after time."
--Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.)Mulvaney and English began jostling for position almost immediately after the workday began Monday morning, with both insisting that the law is on their side.
In an email to CFPB staffers, English wrote "[i]t is an honor to work with all of you," signing the note "acting director." Around two hours later, Mulvaney sent his own message to the agency's 1,600 employees, imploring them to "disregard any instructions you receive from Ms. English in her presumed capacity as acting director."
Weighing in on who has the proper authority to run the agency, former Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.)--co-author of the 2010 legislation that brought the CFPB into existence--concluded that it is "clearly" English.
"When we wrote the law creating the CFPB, we deliberately tried to give it some protection from the normal political process," Frank noted, arguing that such protections are necessary for an agency tasked with battling powerful Wall Street firms.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.)--an original architect of the CFPB--echoed Frank's conclusion in an interview with the Washington Post on Monday. "Dodd-Frank is quite specific: It provides its own succession planning," Warren observed. "There is no vacancy for President Trump to fill."
The demonstrators who gathered outside CFPB headquarters early Monday morning also expressed their agreement with Frank's assessment.
Led by a coalition of consumer advocacy groups including Public Citizen and Americans for Financial Reform, protesters denounced the White House's attempt to appoint Mulvaney and hoisted signs highlighting the CFPB's role in combating "the abuses of triple-digit interest payday and car-title lenders," going "to bat for victims of sham for-profit colleges," and "standing up to Wall Street banksters and fraudsters."
In a speech during Monday's gathering, Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) argued that the Trump administration's effort to place Mulvaney at the helm of the CFPB represents an explicit move to "thwart the independence" of the agency and "vaporize" its power to protect consumers from predatory financial institutions.
Watch:
As Common Dreams has reported, the legal stand-off between Mulvaney and English was sparked by CFPB director Richard Cordray's departure on Friday--a week sooner than anticipated.
Shortly after announcing his resignation, Cordray named English deputy director of the agency, placing her in line to become acting director according to Dodd-Frank. The Trump administration quickly countered by naming Mulvaney as interim CFPB chief, a move the White House has since justified by citing a Justice Department memo penned by Steven Engel--a DOJ attorney who has represented payday lenders before the CFPB, as David Dayen reported for The Intercept on Monday.
"Having a former adversary to CFPB weigh in on who is the legal acting director of the agency raises questions over Engel's independence and potential conflict of interest," Dayen wrote.
Sen. Warren concluded on Monday that the Trump administration's maneuvering also raises questions about the president's expressed commitment to being the "voice" of the working class.
"This is about whose side President Trump is on--big banks, or working families," Warren said. "So far in his administration, he has chosen the big banks time after time."
As the showdown at the agency continues, a ruling on the lawsuit filed by English from a federal district court is expected as the next legal development.
In what was characterized as "terrible luck" for the CFPB, English v. Trump was assigned to Judge Timothy Kelly, a Trump appointee.
An Urgent Message From Our Co-Founder
Dear Common Dreams reader, It’s been nearly 30 years since I co-founded Common Dreams with my late wife, Lina Newhouser. We had the radical notion that journalism should serve the public good, not corporate profits. It was clear to us from the outset what it would take to build such a project. No paid advertisements. No corporate sponsors. No millionaire publisher telling us what to think or do. Many people said we wouldn't last a year, but we proved those doubters wrong. Together with a tremendous team of journalists and dedicated staff, we built an independent media outlet free from the constraints of profits and corporate control. Our mission has always been simple: To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. Building Common Dreams was not easy. Our survival was never guaranteed. When you take on the most powerful forces—Wall Street greed, fossil fuel industry destruction, Big Tech lobbyists, and uber-rich oligarchs who have spent billions upon billions rigging the economy and democracy in their favor—the only bulwark you have is supporters who believe in your work. But here’s the urgent message from me today. It's never been this bad out there. And it's never been this hard to keep us going. At the very moment Common Dreams is most needed, the threats we face are intensifying. We need your support now more than ever. We don't accept corporate advertising and never will. We don't have a paywall because we don't think people should be blocked from critical news based on their ability to pay. Everything we do is funded by the donations of readers like you. When everyone does the little they can afford, we are strong. But if that support retreats or dries up, so do we. Will you donate now to make sure Common Dreams not only survives but thrives? —Craig Brown, Co-founder |
Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.
Already facing a lawsuit charging that his appointment to head the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) is "unlawful," White House budget director Mick Mulvaney was confronted with outraged protests on Monday as he arrived at CFPB headquarters for his first day as "acting director" of the agency--a title also claimed by Leandra English, the CFPB's deputy director.
"This is about whose side President Trump is on--big banks, or working families. So far in his administration, he has chosen the big banks time after time."
--Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.)Mulvaney and English began jostling for position almost immediately after the workday began Monday morning, with both insisting that the law is on their side.
In an email to CFPB staffers, English wrote "[i]t is an honor to work with all of you," signing the note "acting director." Around two hours later, Mulvaney sent his own message to the agency's 1,600 employees, imploring them to "disregard any instructions you receive from Ms. English in her presumed capacity as acting director."
Weighing in on who has the proper authority to run the agency, former Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.)--co-author of the 2010 legislation that brought the CFPB into existence--concluded that it is "clearly" English.
"When we wrote the law creating the CFPB, we deliberately tried to give it some protection from the normal political process," Frank noted, arguing that such protections are necessary for an agency tasked with battling powerful Wall Street firms.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.)--an original architect of the CFPB--echoed Frank's conclusion in an interview with the Washington Post on Monday. "Dodd-Frank is quite specific: It provides its own succession planning," Warren observed. "There is no vacancy for President Trump to fill."
The demonstrators who gathered outside CFPB headquarters early Monday morning also expressed their agreement with Frank's assessment.
Led by a coalition of consumer advocacy groups including Public Citizen and Americans for Financial Reform, protesters denounced the White House's attempt to appoint Mulvaney and hoisted signs highlighting the CFPB's role in combating "the abuses of triple-digit interest payday and car-title lenders," going "to bat for victims of sham for-profit colleges," and "standing up to Wall Street banksters and fraudsters."
In a speech during Monday's gathering, Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) argued that the Trump administration's effort to place Mulvaney at the helm of the CFPB represents an explicit move to "thwart the independence" of the agency and "vaporize" its power to protect consumers from predatory financial institutions.
Watch:
As Common Dreams has reported, the legal stand-off between Mulvaney and English was sparked by CFPB director Richard Cordray's departure on Friday--a week sooner than anticipated.
Shortly after announcing his resignation, Cordray named English deputy director of the agency, placing her in line to become acting director according to Dodd-Frank. The Trump administration quickly countered by naming Mulvaney as interim CFPB chief, a move the White House has since justified by citing a Justice Department memo penned by Steven Engel--a DOJ attorney who has represented payday lenders before the CFPB, as David Dayen reported for The Intercept on Monday.
"Having a former adversary to CFPB weigh in on who is the legal acting director of the agency raises questions over Engel's independence and potential conflict of interest," Dayen wrote.
Sen. Warren concluded on Monday that the Trump administration's maneuvering also raises questions about the president's expressed commitment to being the "voice" of the working class.
"This is about whose side President Trump is on--big banks, or working families," Warren said. "So far in his administration, he has chosen the big banks time after time."
As the showdown at the agency continues, a ruling on the lawsuit filed by English from a federal district court is expected as the next legal development.
In what was characterized as "terrible luck" for the CFPB, English v. Trump was assigned to Judge Timothy Kelly, a Trump appointee.
Already facing a lawsuit charging that his appointment to head the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) is "unlawful," White House budget director Mick Mulvaney was confronted with outraged protests on Monday as he arrived at CFPB headquarters for his first day as "acting director" of the agency--a title also claimed by Leandra English, the CFPB's deputy director.
"This is about whose side President Trump is on--big banks, or working families. So far in his administration, he has chosen the big banks time after time."
--Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.)Mulvaney and English began jostling for position almost immediately after the workday began Monday morning, with both insisting that the law is on their side.
In an email to CFPB staffers, English wrote "[i]t is an honor to work with all of you," signing the note "acting director." Around two hours later, Mulvaney sent his own message to the agency's 1,600 employees, imploring them to "disregard any instructions you receive from Ms. English in her presumed capacity as acting director."
Weighing in on who has the proper authority to run the agency, former Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.)--co-author of the 2010 legislation that brought the CFPB into existence--concluded that it is "clearly" English.
"When we wrote the law creating the CFPB, we deliberately tried to give it some protection from the normal political process," Frank noted, arguing that such protections are necessary for an agency tasked with battling powerful Wall Street firms.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.)--an original architect of the CFPB--echoed Frank's conclusion in an interview with the Washington Post on Monday. "Dodd-Frank is quite specific: It provides its own succession planning," Warren observed. "There is no vacancy for President Trump to fill."
The demonstrators who gathered outside CFPB headquarters early Monday morning also expressed their agreement with Frank's assessment.
Led by a coalition of consumer advocacy groups including Public Citizen and Americans for Financial Reform, protesters denounced the White House's attempt to appoint Mulvaney and hoisted signs highlighting the CFPB's role in combating "the abuses of triple-digit interest payday and car-title lenders," going "to bat for victims of sham for-profit colleges," and "standing up to Wall Street banksters and fraudsters."
In a speech during Monday's gathering, Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) argued that the Trump administration's effort to place Mulvaney at the helm of the CFPB represents an explicit move to "thwart the independence" of the agency and "vaporize" its power to protect consumers from predatory financial institutions.
Watch:
As Common Dreams has reported, the legal stand-off between Mulvaney and English was sparked by CFPB director Richard Cordray's departure on Friday--a week sooner than anticipated.
Shortly after announcing his resignation, Cordray named English deputy director of the agency, placing her in line to become acting director according to Dodd-Frank. The Trump administration quickly countered by naming Mulvaney as interim CFPB chief, a move the White House has since justified by citing a Justice Department memo penned by Steven Engel--a DOJ attorney who has represented payday lenders before the CFPB, as David Dayen reported for The Intercept on Monday.
"Having a former adversary to CFPB weigh in on who is the legal acting director of the agency raises questions over Engel's independence and potential conflict of interest," Dayen wrote.
Sen. Warren concluded on Monday that the Trump administration's maneuvering also raises questions about the president's expressed commitment to being the "voice" of the working class.
"This is about whose side President Trump is on--big banks, or working families," Warren said. "So far in his administration, he has chosen the big banks time after time."
As the showdown at the agency continues, a ruling on the lawsuit filed by English from a federal district court is expected as the next legal development.
In what was characterized as "terrible luck" for the CFPB, English v. Trump was assigned to Judge Timothy Kelly, a Trump appointee.
We've had enough. The 1% own and operate the corporate media. They are doing everything they can to defend the status quo, squash dissent and protect the wealthy and the powerful. The Common Dreams media model is different. We cover the news that matters to the 99%. Our mission? To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. How? Nonprofit. Independent. Reader-supported. Free to read. Free to republish. Free to share. With no advertising. No paywalls. No selling of your data. Thousands of small donations fund our newsroom and allow us to continue publishing. Can you chip in? We can't do it without you. Thank you.