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'While No One Is Watching,' Senate GOP Makes It Easier for Wall Street Banks to Gouge Working Families
Sen. Warren decried Republicans for helping "squeeze" struggling families and warned that the "latest attack on the CFPB would let big banks rake in huge profits by slamming working people with outrageous overdraft fees."
Mar 27, 2025
All but one Republican in the U.S. Senate voted Wednesday night to advance a joint resolution that would nullify a cap on overdraft fees, a protection put in place by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to prevent Wall Street banks from making billions more in profits on the backs of vulnerable American consumers.
"Republicans in the Senate voted tonight while no one is watching to fatten Wall Street profits by jacking up overdraft fees on you," said Sen. Elizabeth Warren, following the 52-47 vote that fell almost strictly along party lines. "So much for lowering costs," she added.
Not one Democrat voted in favor pushing the rule forward, while only Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) voted against and Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) did not vote.
In a speech on the Senate floor ahead of the vote, Sen. Warren decried Republicans for helping Wall Street "squeeze" struggling families and warned the "latest attack on the CFPB would let big banks rake in huge profits by slamming working people with outrageous overdraft fees."
Senate Republicans’ latest attack on the CFPB would let big banks rake in huge profits by slamming working people with outrageous overdraft fees.
I spoke on the Senate floor to fight back—because American families deserve a system that works for them, not just Wall Street. pic.twitter.com/W0VzO3cX1I
— Elizabeth Warren (@SenWarren) March 26, 2025
The draft rule was put in place in the final months of the Biden administration as a way to curb excessive fees and provide reasonable protections for consumers who overdraft their accounts. As The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports:
In 2023, big banks made $5.8 billion from overdraft and non-sufficient fund fees, according to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. CFPB announced a new rule capping those fees in December, shortly before [President Joe] Biden left office, that is slated to take effect in October.
The rule gave banks three options: cap overdraft fees at $5; if offering overdraft as a service, rather than for profits, charge a fee that covered the bank's costs and losses; or if looking to make a profit off an overdraft loan, disclose the loan terms to consumers beforehand.
For households that pay overdraft fees, the rule was expected to save them $225 a year.
Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-Ga.) joined Warren in slamming his Republican colleagues over the vote.
"If we leave this $5 cap for overdraft fees in place, guess what, [the banks will] still be doing just fine,” Warnock told the Journal-Constitution. "But if we overturn it, families that are already being squeezed by inflation and by tariffs and a whole range of bad policies that are putting them in jeopardy are going to be squeezed even more."
According to the watchdog group Accountable.US, lifting the rule will allow large Wall Street banks and other financial institutions "to continue exploiting American families" with little or no recourse for relief from such predatory and profit-seeking practices.
"Senate Republicans are siding with big banks to make it easier for them to trick their customers into paying excessive fees," said Tony Carrk, the group's executive director, on Thursday. "The CFPB's overdraft rule limits abusive fees and puts money back in the pockets of consumers. Any vote against the rule is a gift to Wall Street special interests at our expense."
With the
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Senate GOP Comes Up Big for Elon Musk Grift by Further Defanging Consumer Bureau
"The U.S. Senate just gave Elon Musk a green light to throw consumers to the online wolves."
Mar 06, 2025
Despite warnings of a "blatant gift" that would be bestowed on the world's richest man while harming everyday consumers, the GOP majority in the U.S. Senate on Wednesday passed a resolution that would block the government's Consumer Financial Protection Bureau from regulating online payment systems like Venmo, Google Pay, Apple Pay, and—when it comes to Elon Musk—his proposed X Money, an extension of the social media giant he owns.
The vote on the resolution in the Republican-controlled Senate was 51 to 47, with two senators not voting. Every member of the Democratic caucus, including Independent Sens. Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Angus King of Maine, voted against the measure while every Republican but one, Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri, voted in favor.
The legislation, if also approved by the GOP-controlled House and signed by President Donald Trump, would nullify a rule put forth by the Biden administration allowing the CFPB to more closely monitor the growing army of online payment services.
Critics of Republican efforts to destroy the rule, as well as broader efforts to undermine the CFPB's ability to serve as a watchdog for the financial industry, have said that restricting the agency's oversight in this sector would be a direct giveaway to Musk due to his pronounced personal interest in the online payment space that could be worth billions of dollars in future profits.
"The U.S. Senate just gave Elon Musk a green light to throw consumers to the online wolves," said Emily Peterson-Cassin, corporate power director at Demand Progress, a progressive advocacy group.
"In no way should X, a platform already swarming with bots and crypto scams, be allowed to accept real-time payments without having to follow the same consumer protection oversight that major banks have to follow," Peterson-Cassin added. "Without CFPB supervision, X Money users who are hacked, scammed, or want to dispute fraudulent payments could be left to fend for themselves. We call on the House to stand on the side of consumers, and not online scammers, by voting against this corrupt, reckless bill."
In a statement on Wednesday following the vote, Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) said the resolution was akin to a "Get Out of Jail Free Card" for Musk.
In a joint letter to acting director of the Office of Government Ethics, Secretary Doug Collins, Warren and Schiff demanded answers about Musk's conflicts of interest as he spearheads the Trump-invented Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, while that pseudo agency targets the CFPB.
According to the letter:
In addition to his role as head of DOGE, Mr. Musk is the primary owner of the social media company X. Since purchasing X, Mr. Musk has considered expanding the social media platform into digital payments. On January 28, X announced a partnership with Visa to process peer-to-peer payments and launch a digital wallet. Notably, the CFPB has taken steps in recent years to protect consumers from fraud on digital payment apps and collects proprietary information from the digital payment industry. Mr. Musk is also the founder and CEO of Tesla, which offers customers the option of working with Tesla to finance their auto purchases. The CFPB plays a critical role in supervising the auto lending industry and protecting consumers from corporate malfeasance and scams. Therefore, actions by Mr. Musk and DOGE at the CFPB have the potential to directly benefit X, Visa, and Tesla—and by extension, Mr. Musk.
Warren and Schiff argued that "potential criminal consequences" could be on the table for Musk, noting in their letter that if the right-wing billionaire "has taken actions in his federal role that will benefit his financial interests without receiving appropriate waivers and approvals, he may have violated the criminal conflict of interest statute."
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As Musk Attacks CFPB, GOP Lawmakers Take Aim at Overdraft Rule—A Gift to Wall Street
"This is just the latest broken promise from Republicans, who have used their short time in power to already cater to special interests over hardworking Americans," said one watchdog leader.
Feb 18, 2025
A U.S. watchdog group on Tuesday slammed Republicans in Congress for trying to kill the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's overdraft rule as U.S. President Donald Trump and billionaire Elon Musk target the CFPB as a whole.
The Accountable.US statement came in response to Senate Banking Committee Chair Tim Scott (R-S.C.) and House Financial Services Committee Chair French Hill (R-Ark.) recently introducing a Congressional Review Act (CRA) resolution to overturn the rule that capped most overdraft fees at $5, which was finalized in December, near the end of the former President Joe Biden's term.
"Overdraft fees affect a huge portion of American families with 17% of households with checking accounts paying overdraft or [nonsufficient funds] fees in 2023," Accountable.US noted. "This action would open the door for $35 overdraft fees—a decision that would cost American households an average of $225 each year."
The watchdog's executive director, Tony Carrk, declared that "undoing the CFPB's overdraft fee rule is a gift to big banks and a gut punch to the wallets of millions of Americans across the country."
"Deceitful and excessive overdraft fees cost Americans billions of dollars every year, but the Trump administration and Republicans in Congress don't seem to care any longer about lowering costs for Americans now that they're in charge," he continued. "This is just the latest broken promise from Republicans, who have used their short time in power to already cater to special interests over hardworking Americans."
When the Republican chairs introduced their CRA resolution last week, Scott called the Biden-era CFPB rule an example of the "pursuit of political headlines over sound policies," and Hill described it "midnight rulemaking" and "another form of government price controls that hurt consumers who deserve financial protections and greater choice."
Meanwhile, when the CFPB finalized the rule, the agency said that it "took action to close an outdated overdraft loophole that exempted overdraft loans from lending laws." At the time, the bureau was still directed by Biden appointee Rohit Chopra, who highlighted that large banks' exploitation of the loophole had "drained billions of dollars from Americans' deposit accounts."
The rule "was scheduled to become effective in October," but "because of acting Director Russ Vought's unlawful order stalling all CFPB work, the effective date has been suspended," The American Prospect reported Monday. "If Congress passes the CRA resolution, the overdraft rule could not come back in any 'substantially similar' form. So it matters if congressional Republicans decide to support allowing banks to impose additional junk fees worth billions of dollars."
The outlet also pointed out that "because CRA resolutions cannot be stopped by a filibuster, they represent some of the most likely legislative actions of the early Trump term," given Republicans' narrow majorities in Congress."
It's not just the rule that's in jeopardy; the entire agency is at risk. Trump and Musk, the leader of the president's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE)—though perhaps not on paper—are working to gut the federal workforce and slash spending, and they have the CFPB in their crosshairs.
An agreement reached Friday in federal court halted mass firings at the CFPB and barred the bureau and its temporary leader, Vought—who also leads the Office of Management and Budget—from purging data or defunding the agency while the case moves forward. However, Trump and Musk are expected to continue their effort.
"The same billionaires trying to kill the CFPB are the ones who profit off predatory loans, sky-high fees, and financial scams that target young people," Corryn G. Freeman, executive director of the youth-focused Future Coalition, said Monday. "The CFPB should be strengthened, not eliminated. If Musk and his allies succeed in gutting this agency, it will be open season on young consumers with no one left to protect them."
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