Dear [Editorial Page Editor or Writer],

Next week, the Senate will consider the nomination of Richard Cordray as director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. With {NAME OF SENATOR} and 42 of his colleagues still threatening to block a vote, I am writing to urge you to speak out against the continued political assault on this badly needed agency.

The CFPB was created after the 2008 crisis to bring fairness and transparency to the world of credit cards, mortgages, education loans, auto loans, debt collection, credit scoring and other financial products and practices. Here is some of what it has already done:

• Returned nearly half a billion dollars to consumers cheated by credit card companies;
• Moved to end the era of mortgages designed to rake in up-front fees before they self-destruct;
• Stood up for students and families trapped in high-cost private education loans; and
• Protected military families against illegal foreclosures and deceptive lending practices

Since his recess appointment in January 2012, former Ohio Attorney General Cordray has won praise from bankers as well as consumer advocates and Republicans as well as Democrats.  “I think you have done a wonderful job so far in carrying out your duties,” Senator Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) told Cordray at a recent Senate hearing.

Nevertheless, Coburn, {NAME OF SENATOR}, and others are trying to dramatically weaken the CFPB, based on false claims about its “unprecedented” power. In truth, it’s just one of a number of financial regulators with single directors and independent funding – the two main things the Senators want to change. And the CFPB already faces serious checks on its authority, including a provision of the law making its decisions, unlike those of other bank watchdogs, subject to veto by a committee of financial regulators known as the Financial Stability Oversight Council.

If there is anything unprecedented here, it’s in the nature of the attacks on the CFPB, not in the agency itself. At bottom, this is the story of a minority of legislators who voted against the Dodd-Frank Act and against the creation of the CFPB who are trying to use the filibuster and the confirmation process to achieve a policy reversal they could never hope to win directly. They are trying to rewrite a law that passed both houses of Congress by substantial margins and commands wide public support across lines of party and geography.

Senator {NAME} and the others should take a moment to remember the price the country paid for not having such an agency, leaving the banks to the exclusive oversight of regulators focused on protecting financial “safety and soundness” – a concept often viewed as synonymous with protecting industry profits. And they should reflect on the consequences of continued intransigence.

Without a director, the CFPB’s powers over banks remain broad, but its authority over their financial competitors may be limited. This un-level playing field works to the advantage of payday lenders, debt collectors, unaccountable credit reporting agencies, mortgage companies and other nonbanks, making it too easy for them to continue to engage in deceptive and abusive practices.

The bureau’s opponents were emboldened by a recent D.C. Circuit court ruling dramatically limiting recess appointments. Since that decision, several Senators have called for Cordray’s resignation, and lobbyists with interests at stake have been “predicting” that the bureau’s supporters will have to give in to their demands. But they are taking a large and unfounded leap. Recess appointments have a long, bipartisan history. This is just one court’s finding in a case involving the National Labor Relations Board, not the CFPB. The ruling has been appealed, and will be far from the last word on the matter.

The confirmation process, in any case, is not the right place to re-argue the CFPB’s funding and governance. The perils facing financial consumers are too great to permit this agency to be disrupted and weakened. In practice, the Senate faces a simple choice: allow an up/down vote on this nomination, or open the door to more of the abusive practices the CFPB is working hard to prevent.

If you decide to write about this, you may find useful material on the Americans for Financial Reform website. See dropdown menu under “Confirm Cordray / Defend the CFPB” at ourfinancialsecurity.org. Please feel free to call or email if we can help in any other way.

Sincerely,