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Letters to Regulators: Letter Urging HUD to Take Action to Protect Borrowers in Upcoming LIBOR Transition

Americans for Financial Reform Education Fund, Center for Responsible Lending, National Consumer Law Center, National Fair Housing Alliance, and Student Borrower Protection Center sent a joint letter urging HUD to transition to the Secured Overnight Financing Rate (SOFR) and share its LIBOR transition plan as soon as possible. This transition plan should include providing direction to housing counselors about the process and a targeted outreach plan to provide borrowers and all stakeholders with timely, accurate information so that they know what to expect in the months to come. 

LETTER TO REGULATORS: Broad Opposition to the CFPB’s Plan to Engage in Payday Loan Disclosure Testing

The Americans for Financial Reform and the undersigned consumer, civil rights, community and faith- based organizations oppose the Bureau’s plans to engage in payday loan disclosure testing. We do so in the broader context of the Bureau’s having repealed much-needed substantive ability-to-repay protections without basis and in light of the overwhelming evidence that disclosures will not protect consumers from the harms associated with payday lenders’ practice of making payday loans without reasonable ability-to-repay determinations. New disclosures would only provide a false veneer of protections that payday lenders would use to bolster their opposition to meaningful consumer protections against unaffordable loans.

In The News: New Trump admin rules make it easier for lenders to charge small businesses super-high interest rates (NBC News)

“It’s been hard for small businesses to get the money they need to survive,” said Linda Jun, senior policy counsel at Americans for Financial Reform, a nonprofit advocacy group, “and now we have the bank regulators, instead of trying to work with their institutions on that, saying, ‘We’re going to throw some more sharks your way.'”

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Statement: Student loan suspension extension gives millions another month of certainty, but more needs to be done

In October, AFR joined 76 other organizations to call on Secretary DeVos to extend the federal student loan suspension. We are glad that Secretary DeVos has heeded this call, extending the suspension through the end of January 2021. But we still need a long term solution. We look forward to seeing the incoming Biden administration extend the federal student loan suspension even further, ensure all federal student loan borrowers are covered, and provide crucial relief to millions by cancelling federal student debt via executive action.

Letters to Regulators: Comment Letter to the CFPB on the Equal Credit Opportunity Act

AFREF and 47 organizations submitted comments on the CFPB’s RFI on the Equal Credit Opportunity Act (ECOA) and Regulation B. Our comments urged the Bureau to take no action that would weaken the ECOA in any way and consider certain steps to improve and strengthen fair lending protections under ECOA to make it stronger and more effective tool for fighting credit discrimination.

Letter to Regulators: Letter to the Small Business Administration urging them to maintain strong information collection requirements under the Paycheck Protection Program

Americans for Financial Reform Education Fund (AFREF) and Main Street Alliance (MSA) respectfully urge the Small Business Administration (SBA) to maintain the information collection under the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) new Loan Necessity Questionnaire for recipients and encourage the SBA to support robust supplemental disclosure requirements for PPP recipients.