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rohit chopra
Trump's Billionaire Appointee Targets Consumer Protections by Halting All CFPB Operations
Appointment of billionaire Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent to lead key agency, warned one advocate, "opens the floodgates for corporate abuse and financial scams."
Feb 03, 2025
U.S. President Donald Trump announced Monday that he has installed Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, a billionaire hedge fund manager, to serve as acting director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, an agency that has long been in the crosshairs of Elon Musk, Republican lawmakers, and corporate America.
The news comes days after Trump fired Rohit Chopra, the consumer champion who served as head of the CFPB under former President Joe Biden and secured more than $6 billion in consumer relief during his tenure.
Soon after taking charge of the CFPB, Bessent ordered the bureau to "stop all rulemaking, communications, litigation, and other activities," Bloomberg Lawreported Monday, citing an email to agency staff.
"A source inside the bureau who asked to remain anonymous said the order appeared to shut down the CFPB altogether, for the time being," the outlet added.
Politicoreported that Bessent also directed staff to "suspend the effective dates of rules that haven't gone into effect yet." Among the rules now in limbo is a measure that, if enacted, would save consumers billions of dollars per year in overdraft fees.
Tony Carrk, executive director of the progressive watchdog group Accountable.US, said in a statement Monday that "we can only hope that Bessent continues former Director Rohit Chopra's legacy standing up to price gouging and fraud, but I fear his appointment opens the floodgates for corporate abuse and financial scams."
"President Trump has held himself up as a champion for working Americans, but his plans for the CFPB are just another example of the administration's billionaires-first, consumers-last agenda," said Carrk. "While he parades a crowd of corporate lobbyists, billionaire donors, and Wall Street insiders like Scott Bessent to lead our country, we're looking at the end of basic protections for American consumers."
Trump's decision to place a Cabinet official in charge of the CFPB mirrors the approach he took during his first White House term, when he installed CFPB opponent Mick Mulvaney—who was then in charge of the Office of Management and Budget—at the helm of the consumer bureau.
"In both cases," The American Bankernoted Monday, "Trump is picking a director who is expected to move quickly to freeze existing rules and enforcement actions, while also halting and starting to rescind all nonbinding interpretive rules, guidance, and proposals. One of Mulvaney's first moves was to strip the agency's fair-lending office of enforcement powers, demoting the fair-lending division, which had previously been equal alongside supervision and enforcement."
Bessent, whose elevation to acting head of the CFPB was applauded by bank lobbyists, is currently facing close scrutiny and backlash over his decision last week to give Musk agents access to the Treasury Department's payment system.
In a letter to Bessent on Sunday, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.)—an architect of the CFPB—expressed alarm that "as one of your first acts as secretary, you appear to have handed over a highly sensitive system responsible for millions of Americans' private data—and a key function of government—to an unelected billionaire and an unknown number of his unqualified flunkies."
"The American people deserve answers about your role in this mismanagement, which threatens the privacy and economic security of every American," Warren added.
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In 'Enormous Loss for the American People,' Trump Fires CFPB Head Rohit Chopra
"For all the claims Trump and the GOP have made about being the voice of working-class voters, firing Chopra... only satisfies unscrupulous corporations and unelected billionaires like Elon Musk," one advocate said.
Feb 01, 2025
U.S. President Donald Trump moved Saturday morning to fire Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Director Rohit Chopra, who had earned the praise of consumer advocates and the ire of Wall Street for his efforts to return more than $6 billion to ordinary Americans.
Chopra announced his firing on social media, also sharing a letter to the president in which he touted the work of the CFPB and outlined possible priorities for his successor.
"Every day, Americans from across the country shared their ideas and experiences with us," Chopra wrote to his followers. "You helped us hold powerful companies and their executives accountable for breaking the law, and you made our work better. Thank you."
In his letter, Chopra mounted a full-throated defense of the CFPB, which has often been attacked by Republicans and pro-Trump figures, including billionaire Elon Musk. He wrote that the 2008 financial crisis "made Americans question whether regulators and law enforcement would hold companies and their executives accountable for their mismanagement or wrongdoing," especially since many of the companies responsible for the crash only got larger and more powerful following a taxpayer-funded bailout.
"That's what agencies like CFPB work to fix: to make sure that the laws of our land aren't just words on a page," he wrote, adding that "with so much power concentrated in the hands of a few, agencies like the CFPB have never been more critical."
Chopra, who was appointed by former President Joe Biden to head the CFPB in 2021, said that he was "proud the CFPB had done so much to restore the rule of law" during his tenure.
"Since 2021, we have returned billions of dollars from repeat offenders and other bad actors, implemented dormant legal authorities and long-overdue rules required by law, and given more freedom and bargaining leverage to families navigating a complex and confusing financial system," he wrote.
"If civil society does its job, every person unnecessarily taken advantage of by a financial institution will attribute the blame to the right person—Donald Trump."
Chopra also touted the CFPB's regulation of junk fees, inaccurate medical bills, and digital surveillance by Big Tech. Under Chopra, the CFPB sued major financial institutions such as Bank of America and JP Morgan Chase and finalized a rule to strike around $49 billion worth of medical debt from credit reports, according to CNN.
With Chopra in charge, the bureau "has fought against junk fees, repeat offenders, big tech evasions, and corporate deception. It has championed competition, transparency, accountability, and consumer financial health," Adam Rust, director of financial services for the Consumer Federation of America, said in a statement reported by NPR.
Despite the fact that Chopra was originally appointed by Trump in 2018 to serve on the Federal Trade Commission, Chopra's firing was expected as soon as Trump took office, with both major banks and tech companies urging the new president to oust him.
While anticipated, the move was criticized by progressive advocates and lawmakers.
"For all the claims Trump and the GOP have made about being the voice of working-class voters, firing Chopra and attacking the CFPB only satisfies unscrupulous corporations and unelected billionaires like Elon Musk," Revolving Door Project founder and executive director Jeff Hauser said in a statement. "If civil society does its job, every person unnecessarily taken advantage of by a financial institution will attribute the blame to the right person—Donald Trump."
Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) called his firing "an enormous loss for the American people."
"My friend Rohit Chopra has done an incredible job leading the CFPB—standing up to big corporations, protecting consumer data, and saving money for poor and working families," Jayapal said on social media.
Former Labor Secretary Robert Reich wrote on social media: "Under Rohit Chopra's tenure, the CFPB continued to serve as a shining example of government working on behalf of the people. Chopra took on corporate greed, unnecessary junk fees, predatory lending, and other financial shenanigans. It's telling that Trump just fired him."
According toThe New York Times, the CFPB under Trump is expected by financial industry officials to roll back some of Chopra's regulations and to issue fewer new rules and weaken enforcement.
However, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) pointed out that this would run counter to Trump's own campaign rhetoric.
"President Trump campaigned on capping credit card interest rates at 10% and lowering costs for Americans. He needs a strong CFPB and a strong CFPB director to do that," she said in a statement. "But if President Trump and Republicans decide to cower to Wall Street billionaires and destroy the agency, they will have a fight on their hands."
Chopra himself, in his farewell letter to Trump, suggested steps the CFPB could take under new leadership. These included:
- Following up on proposals to stop countries like Russia and China from spying on Americans using commercial data;
- Following up on proposals to stop large tech and financial platforms from censoring users based on religious beliefs or opinions; and
- Acting on evidence uncovered during earlier investigations of Big Tech and Wall Street.
"We have also analyzed your promising proposal on capping credit card interest rates, and we see a path for enacting meaningful reform," he wrote to Trump. "I hope that the CFPB will continue to be a pillar of restoring and advancing economic liberty in America."
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Wall Street Journal Fumes as CFPB Chief Rohit Chopra Keeps Up Fight for Consumers Under Trump
"If Chopra continues to make life miserable for financial operators and oligarchs—Big Tech has been one of his main concerns—the pressure to dump him will grow," wrote one journalist.
Jan 24, 2025
The editorial board of The Wall Street Journalvented its frustration Thursday that Rohit Chopra, the director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, is still in his post at the end of the first week of U.S. President Donald Trump's second White House term.
"Why Is Rohit Chopra Still Employed at the CFPB?" reads the headline of an editorial the Journal published late Thursday, hours after the Chopra-led bureau announced that it is opening a docket for public comment on credit card interest rates and other terms.
"Americans owe well over $1 trillion in credit card debt, and many feel crushed by sky-high interest and fees," Chopra wrote in a social media post Thursday morning.
Morgan Harper, director of policy and advocacy at the American Economic Liberties Project, said in a statement that "the only groups opposing this effort are big banks and credit card companies, which would rather see the agency sit idly by as they rake in excess profits from consumers through fees and interest rates that often surpass 30%."
Chopra was chosen by former President Joe Biden to lead the CFPB, a frequent target of attacks from Republicans and Trump allies, including billionaire Elon Musk. During his first White House stint, Trump attempted to gut the CFPB by installing an opponent of the bureau to lead it.
But while Chopra has packed up his office in Washington, D.C., Trump has yet to fire the CFPB chief—a fact that is reportedly making Wall Street nervous.
"It's just amusing that the time hasn't come yet. Amid all the other wreckage, watching Wall Street squirm a bit is at least a tiny bit of solace."
The Journal's editorial board, a reliable mouthpiece for big business, complained Thursday that Chopra "has spent his tenure advancing progressive hobbyhorses, including rules that ban medical debt on consumer credit reports and cap bank overdraft fees."
The editorial goes on to claim, citing anonymous sources, that Chopra has "sought to ingratiate himself with [Vice President] JD Vance in hopes of serving out his term," which officially ends in October 2026.
News reports suggest that Trump's team has "struggled to make selections to replace" Chopra—a difficulty that one watchdog said is unsurprising.
"Being the hatchet person for the sort of chiselers and grifters that the CFPB fights against is not exactly a fun job—especially as some elements within MAGA could potentially call you out," Jeff Hauser of the Revolving Door Project toldThe American Prospect.
In a column on Friday, the Prospect's David Dayen wrote that Chopra's continued presence at the helm of the CFPB is "freaking Wall Street out."
"Though it was expected that he would be quickly let go, his office continues to be active," Dayen noted. "On Tuesday, CFPB announced a settlement with Argus Information and Advisory Services, a TransUnion subsidiary, CFPB contractor, and serial violator of several financial and data privacy laws. Argus agreed to not seek any contracts with CFPB for five years. Then on Thursday, CFPB released a report showing growing instances of auto repossessions, well above the pre-pandemic level."
Over the past four years, the Chopra-led CFPB "managed to put over $6 billion back into the pockets of Americans," according to the Consumer Federation of America.
But Dayen wrote that "if Chopra continues to make life miserable for financial operators and oligarchs—Big Tech has been one of his main concerns—the pressure to dump him will grow."
"It's just amusing that the time hasn't come yet," Dayen added. "Amid all the other wreckage, watching Wall Street squirm a bit is at least a tiny bit of solace."
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