Senate Dems Divide Again Over Reconsideration of Payday Rule

As Acting Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) Director Mick Mulvaney continues to reimagine the agency he temporarily oversees, another rift has opened in Senate Democrats regarding the agency’s interest in reconsidering its rule last year on “Payday, Vehicle Title, and Certain High Cost Installment Loans.” A group of 43 Senate Democrats sent a letter to Mulvaney this week imploring the CFPB’s interim manager to support the rule and continue forward with its implementation.

The signatories of the letter expressed concern that “the CFPB is delaying the rule by granting waivers to companies who would otherwise be taking steps to begin complying with the rule, and that the Bureau may be offering the payday loan industry an opportunity to undermine the rule entirely.”

Absent from the letter are 4 Senate Democrats, Claire McCaskill (MO), Jon Tester (MT), Heidi Heitkamp (ND), and Joe Manchin (WV). That group also recently defected from their party’s stance on banking regulation by voting in favor of a bill that would reform a number of banking rules put forth in the Dodd-Frank Act.

The small group of defecting Senate Democrats are involved in hotly contested races for seats in states that heavily favored President Trump and Republican platforms in 2016. Senator Elizabeth Warren (D- MA), the brainchild of the CFPB and a staunch critic of Dodd-Frank reform, sent a letter of her own to Acting CFPB Director Mulvaney earlier this month demanding he answer more than 100 questions and explain his recent leadership decisions at the consumer agency.