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overdraft fees
Platner Campaign Drills Collins for Siding With Banks in Senate Overdraft Fee Vote
"Susan Collins cares far more about protecting bank executives’ millions than protecting the rest of us from BS overdraft fees," said Platner's campaign manager.
May 14, 2026
Graham Platner's campaign is accusing Sen. Susan Collins of siding with banking interests after she joined Senate Republicans in blocking a Democratic measure to protect consumers from unexpected overdraft fees.
On Wednesday, the GOP voted largely along party lines against a set of Democratic resolutions aiming to restore Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) policies killed by the Trump administration.
In what its acting director, Russell Vought, has described as an effort to effectively dismantle the bureau, which has been credited with delivering more than $21 billion in consumer relief since its creation, he has rescinded 67 policies that protected Americans from junk fees, medical debt, lending discrimination, and other financial abuses.
One resolution voted down Wednesday would have restored a scrapped CFPB guidance against debt collectors hounding consumers over false or inflated medical debts. Another would have reaffirmed that the bureau can scrutinize financial companies for predatory credit practices aimed at military families.
These Democratic resolutions were not expected to pass in a Republican-controlled Senate, but were instead meant to force Republicans to put themselves on the record as standing against consumer interests.
As President Donald Trump takes a beating from voters on the economy, the votes will serve as ammunition as Democrats run with the message that the GOP has "abandoned consumers and is making life more expensive for them," as the CFPB's architect, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass), said on Wednesday.
Platner is already deploying that ammunition in one of November's marquee races, hammering Collins (R-Maine) for voting with the GOP against restoring a guidance enacted by the Biden administration that required banks to obtain customers' consent before charging overdraft fees for ATM and one-time debit card transactions.
"Last night, Susan Collins voted once again to make it easier for big banks to hit Maine families with predatory overdraft fees," his campaign said in an email on Thursday. "Her vote to block even a debate on restoring basic consumer protections was just the latest reminder of where Collins' real loyalties lie."
"There is no legitimate policy rationale for voting against basic consumer protections on overdraft fees,” said Platner's campaign manager, Ben Chin. “But Susan Collins cares far more about protecting bank executives’ millions than protecting the rest of us from BS overdraft fees. This vote is yet another example of this deeply unfortunate reality.”
According to data from OpenSecrets, Collins has received nearly $1.8 million this cycle in contributions from the financial sector, including more than $570,000 from private equity and investment firms, which the Platner campaign said were "among the most predatory actors in the American economy."
She's also received more than $44,000 from commercial banks and holding companies that have a particular interest in her stance on overdraft fees.
The Pine Tree Results PAC, which has thrown about $12.7 million behind Collins, likewise got nearly a third of its funding from figures in the financial sector, particularly in private equity and hedge funds with a broader interest in neutering the CFPB.
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Dismantling the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Hurts US Consumers
Congress can’t allow the White House to eliminate an agency that’s helped millions of Americans, with billions of dollars returned to them by scams, fraudsters, and megabanks that prey on low-income citizens.
Feb 20, 2026
Over the past year, the Trump administration has sought to gut the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau through cuts and layoffs, and by hamstringing its enforcement powers, claiming the agency is hurting large banks through overregulation. Acting CFPB Director Russ Vought has sought to reduce the agency's staff by 90% and to freeze spending since February.
A group of 21 states, plus the District of Columbia, sued the Trump administration in December to stop it from defunding the CFPB. The administration responded by telling the court that the government is legally barred from seeking new funding from the Federal Reserve, the bureau’s primary source of money, alluding to the fact that the agency will eventually go broke later this year. The next step in the case will be the DC Court of Appeals to hear arguments in late February.
The CFPB's enforcement actions, like the 22 pending cases against banks, highlight its vital role in safeguarding consumers from unfair practices, which the current threats jeopardize.
So, what does this mean for the country? The CFPB's weakening could leave consumers vulnerable to predatory practices, unfair fees, and fraud, risking their financial stability.
The Biden administration's pressure on banks and financial institutions on the issue led them to agree to refund more than $240 million to customers, a win secured by actual, formal regulation. Trump and Vought have rolled that back, too.
The CFPB’s Small Dollar Rule was created to curb abusive payday lending practices, especially repeated debit attempts that drain bank accounts and trigger cascading overdraft and Non-Sufficient Funds (NSF) fees. That goal is sound and worthy. The problem is not the rule’s intent, but how it operates alongside bank fee structures and in a financial marketplace devoid of smart, progressive-minded credit options.
The small dollar rule makes automatic repayments—which help keep the cost of borrowing to the bare minimum—incredibly tricky to execute. After two consecutive failed payment attempts, covered lenders generally cannot try again unless the borrower specifically authorizes another attempt, which can leave payments stalled when ordinary life disruptions intervene. Regulators have warned that charging multiple NSF fees tied to re-presented transactions can harm consumers. This is true not just because a single missed payment can still trigger NSF fee collection and financial harm, undermining a rule meant to protect borrowers acting in good faith. It’s also because lenders are now further limiting credit to the most high-risk borrowers, including gig economy workers, who are also those most in need of emergency credit, forcing them to borrow via ultra-expensive bank and credit union overdrafts and NSFs. And when payments are not made, inevitably, borrowers’ personal credit ratings take a hit. Of course, this affects poor people and those with bad credit harder than anyone else.
Trump and Vought's shuttering of the CFPB without fixing this situation, including by pushing banks hard to provide credit to consumers at lower cost and even by standing up a viable alternative to current credit options through something like Postal Banking, would make the problem of high-interest debt worse for Americans. Moreover, because Trump and Vought refuse to act against extortionate overdraft and NSF fees, as the Biden administration did, they’re exposing consumers to high-cost debt, where they effectively borrow from the bank, too. The Biden administration's pressure on banks and financial institutions on the issue led them to agree to refund more than $240 million to customers, a win secured by actual, formal regulation. Trump and Vought have rolled that back, too.
The CFPB has largely helped people when they have problems with a financial institution, product, or transaction by allowing customers to submit complaints, which the agency then works on their behalf. Since its inception, 98% of the 9 million total complaints have received “timely responses” from the institutions or companies to which customers reported them to the CFPB. Of all the complaints, almost 400,000 were submitted by US military members, and nearly 200,000 were submitted by seniors.
The results have been staggering. CFPB data as of December, 2024 shows a whopping $21 billion has been returned to more than 205 million Americans who were financially harmed by institutions. In addition, over $5 billion in civil penalties have been imposed on guilty banks and individuals.
Congress can’t allow the White House to eliminate an agency that’s helped millions of Americans, with billions of dollars returned to them by scams, fraudsters, and megabanks that prey on low-income citizens. And if the Trump administration is determined to do so, it’s time for congressional Democrats to focus on developing credit alternatives that can allow consumers to escape some of the financial madness.
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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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