President Biden today issued an executive order that outlines the administration’s plan to manage the financial risks associated with the climate crisis. The order highlights the administration’s determination to use all the resources of the federal government to combat the threat that climate change poses to financial stability.
AFR’s Linda Jun spoke at MH Action’s event for the release of their report “Displacement, Inc.: How Havenpark Capital and Enterprise Community Partners are eroding affordable housing and how residents are fighting back.”
AFREF joined a letter to the CFPB calling for greater consumer protections in their final debt collection rules.
AFREF joined our partners in a letter urging the House to pass the Comprehensive Debt Collection Improvement Act to protect vulnerable consumers from abusive debt collection practices.
The 18 organizations urge the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to prioritize rebuilding its auditing and enforcement capabilities in order to tackle systemic tax abuses, including in particular those by the private equity industry. The private equity industry has generated greater untaxed revenues over the past decades by structuring their funds to avoid taxes and through a strategy of misclassifying certain earnings, exploiting tax loopholes like carried interest, and utilizing complex and opaque business structures to shield earnings from IRS scrutiny. We applaud President Biden’s plans to fund the IRS and tax enforcement more robustly and believe that these needed changes are a strong argument for such additional resources.
The Americans for Financial Reform (AFR) Language Access Task Force and partner organizations sent a letter to the House Financial Services Committee in support for HR 3009, the Improving Language Access in Mortgage Servicing Act of 2021. LEP borrowers face many challenges that impede their full participation in the consumer marketplace, including, specifically, their ability to obtain and preserve ownership of a home. The Improving Language Access in Mortgage Servicing Act will make important strides in improving access to the mortgage market and increasing awareness of the availability of assistance for homeowners who are struggling to keep up with their mortgage payments, which is especially critical during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.
In a 52-47 vote last night, the U.S. Senate voted to overturn a Trump administration regulation that would allow predatory lenders to evade state interest rate laws by putting a bank’s name on the paperwork.
“The House must now move swiftly to join the Senate and prevent any more rent-a-bank schemes from taking root in the 45 states that cap or otherwise regulate interest rates,” said Linda Jun, senior policy counsel for Americans for Financial Reform.
AFREF, NCLC, and NHLP submitted detailed comments to the CFPB urging the Bureau to strengthen its make necessary improvements to its COVID loss mitigation proposal to protect the most vulnerable borrowers and strengthen protections against foreclosures.
AFR submitted a comment letter to the Securities and Exchange Commission urging the Commission not to approve any additional leveraged ETF based on the Chicago Board of Exchange (CBOE) Volatility Index of the S&P 500 (“VIX”). The letter raises important concerns about not only the