Americans for Financial Reform

Government Category: Advocacy Documents

Letter to the Regulators: AFREF Comments to Department of Treasury Regarding Request for Information on AI in Financial Services

AFREF submitted a comment regarding a request for information on uses, opportunities, and risks of artificial intelligence in the financial services sector. The comment notes that while artificial intelligence (AI), including machine learning and generative models, could potentially transform the financial services industry, insufficiently robust AI regulatory oversight and supervision can harm consumers by amplifying discriminatory patterns in credit markets, increasing consumer costs, and creating barriers to accessible credit. To address these harms, federal regulators should pursue a rights-based and not solely a risk-based approach.

Letters to the Regulators: AFREF and CRL submit comment demonstrating structural racism roots of racial disparities in medical debt

Americans for Financial Reform Education Fund and the Center for Responsible Lending support the rule to prohibit creditors and consumer reporting agencies from using medical debt information for credit eligibility determinations. The rule is essential to protect families from the negative impacts of medical debt on their health and their finances. But the rule is especially important to protect Black, Latine, and other people of color who are more likely to have medical debt burdens.

Letters to Regulators: Equitable and Just Green Lending Starts with Strong Consumer Protections

AFR led a letter signed by 45 environmental justice, energy, consumer, housing, and other organizations urging federal agencies to (1) require consumer protection plans for green lending products across all federal programs, and (2) provide oversight and enforcement around existing consumer protection laws which apply to these products. The letter lays out: Common challenges with green lending