View or download a PDF of the letter here.

Americans for Financial Reform Education Fund (AFREF) submitted a comment supporting a Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s advanced notice of proposed rulemaking (ANPR) to provide relief to victims of coerced debt under the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA). Coerced debt is a form of economic, intimate partner abuse where an abusive partner coerces their partner to take on non-consensual debt (taking out loans in their name) which can lower their credit score, making it even harder for survivors of abuse to leave their abusers, access housing, employment, or other resources tied to credit scores. A proposed rule would expand the definition of “identity theft” and “identity theft report” under FCRA to cover debt taken on without consent, so that survivors can more easily take these debts off their credit reports.