Strong majorities across political parties show concern about the level of student debt in the United States and oppose the Department of Education’s and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB) recent actions to weaken protections for students, according to a new poll released by Americans for Financial Reform (AFR) and the Center for Responsible Lending (CRL).
It was no longer a lonely effort. Mr. Frank, a powerful committee chairman, was now an ally. So was an emerging coalition of progressive groups, labor unions and consumer advocates, known as Americans for Financial Reform. Ms. Warren sought out its leader, Heather Booth, for insight into political organizing. “She knew many of the players on the policy side,” Ms. Booth said. “What she hadn’t been experienced with were the politics.”
Kraninger is wildly unqualified to lead the CFPB: Before her confirmation, she had no experience in consumer protection or financial regulation. Civil rights groups and Wall Street watchdogs [AFR letter linked] uniformly opposed her, while the financial industry supported her—perceiving correctly that she would be, at best, a do-nothing director.
AFR Ed Fund and thirty-three other organizations submitted the following comments in response to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB)’s notice of proposed rulemaking (NPRM) on Debt Collection Practices (Regulation F).
On September 18, 2019, 43 organizations submitted a comment letter to the CFPB about the need for greater protections for Limited English Proficient (LEP) consumers in the debt collection process.
Strong majorities across parties oppose the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB) proposed debt collection rule including medical debt, according to a new poll released by Americans for Financial Reform (AFR) and the Center for Responsible Lending (CRL). The poll was conducted by the bipartisan team of Lake Research Partners and Chesapeake Beach Consulting.
In its proposed rule, CFPB Director Kathy Kraninger is sanctioning consumer harassment by allowing debt collectors to: call consumers seven times per debt, per week; send unlimited emails, texts, and social media messages without consumer consent; allow debt collectors to collect very old “zombie debts” where the time to sue has expired; and file baseless lawsuits by making it easier to sue the wrong consumer, for the wrong amount.
CFPB finalizes policy that gives companies a private channel to seek approvals of untested new products and a promise that the CFPB will not take action for consumer protection law violations
On September 10, 2019, 17 civil rights, consumer and housing advocacy organizations sent a letter to the CFPB addressing QM and urging the Bureau to take additional steps to preserve access to affordable homeownership with adequate consumer protections in place.
Tomorrow marks one hundred fifty days since Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) Director Kathy Kraninger committed to quickly filling the nation’s top student loan watchdog position—a role that has been vacant for almost a year. As student debt nears $1.6 trillion and predatory practices plague the market, the Student Borrower Protection Center (SBPC) and Americans for Financial Reform Education Fund (AFREF) are releasing a roundup of failures by the current CFPB Director to stand up for student loan borrowers.