CFPB’s Top Enforcement Official Resigns

Last week, CFPB acting head of enforcement Cara Petersen turned in her resignation after sending an email to colleagues criticizing the Trump administration’s efforts to dismantle the agency. Petersen served at the Bureau since its creation nearly 15 years ago but said that the current White House’s overhaul of the agency made her position untenable.

“Never before have I seen the ability to perform our core mission so under attack,” Petersen wrote in an email, according to Reuters. “It has been devastating to see the bureau’s enforcement function being dismantled through thoughtless reductions in staff, inexplicable dismissals of cases, and terminations of negotiated settlements that let wrongdoers off the hook.”

Petersen became the CFPB’s acting head of enforcement in February, after previous enforcement leader Eric Halperin resigned for similar reasons. Since then, Acting Director Russell Vought has dismissed most of the agency’s enforcement cases. The New York Times highlighted that this included major lawsuits against large banks for deceptive tactics and fraud on their payment apps.

Vought has also ended several settlement deals, allowing companies to keep money that they agreed to pay in customer refunds and penalties. For example, the Bureau terminated an order last month that required Toyota to refund $48 million to consumers the company had prevented from canceling unwanted insurance products.

These changes to the CFPB came as Republicans have long argued that the agency has too much oversight power, although a federal judge has challenged several of the new directives, including the order to cease operations as well as halting the mass layoffs.

“It is clear that the bureau’s current leadership has no intention to enforce the law in any meaningful way,” Petersen wrote. “While I wish you all the best, I worry for American consumers.”