AFR welcomes appointment of Rich Cordray as FSA COO, urges bold action for student loan borrowers 

Americans for Financial Reform warmly welcomes the news that Richard Cordray has been appointed to be the COO of Federal Student Aid (FSA) at the Department of Education. Cordray served as the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB) inaugural director for six years, and the Bureau quickly became a powerful force for good. The Bureau’s actions under Cordray’s leadership resulted in nearly $12 billion in relief for 29 million consumers. During his tenure, the CFPB effectively stood up for the public interest in consumer finance, including suing big banks for cheating or deceiving consumers, putting mortgage rules in place and strengthening supervision and enforcement over mortgage servicers, and putting limits on predatory lenders.Cordray oversaw the creation of a complaint system that both got relief for problems raised by individual consumers and helped the Bureau recognize and take action on patterns of industry misconduct. Under his leadership the Bureau also sued Navient for systemically cheating borrowers, and for-profit colleges Corinthian and ITT for predatory loan schemes and unfair and abusive practices. 

At FSA, we expect that Cordray will work to address long standing abuses in student loan servicing, and ensure that the unit is putting student loan borrowers first. We call on Cordray and the Department of Education to ensure that FSA is staffed with experts on higher education who reflect the diversity of identity and experience of the country.