The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB)’s staff on Monday were ordered to stop working by the bureau’s new acting director, U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. But Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), ranking member on the Senate Committee for Banking Housing and Urban Affairs, is urging Bessent to “unfreeze” the agency and has sent a letter outlining her reasoning directly to President Donald Trump.
This is according to a Wednesday banking committee hearing, investigating the impacts of debanking, or the elimination of bank accounts for individuals, businesses and other entities.
The bureau, Warren argued, is largely the only agency working to stop the practice of unfair debanking, and is uniquely equipped to assist the White House in stopping debanking from more broadly taking hold in the economy. The president has previously expressed concerns over debanking, calling out certain financial institutions by name and claiming that they have refused to do business with organizations at the forefront of conservative causes like gun manufacturing.
Warren seized on the president’s expressed sentiment, pointing out in her letter that debanking for reasons including “overdraft fees, religious affiliation or political beliefs” is something that a “strong” CFPB would be able to more effectively address.
“Your administration can help to address this problem by supporting the ongoing efforts of the [CFPB], the main agency in our government working to stop unfair debanking, and directing other agencies to use their authorities to bring an end to this practice,” Warren said in her letter. “Treasury Secretary and Acting CFPB Director Scott Bessent’s decision to halt activity at the CFPB will only impede efforts to stop debanking.”
Warren also used her time during the Wednesday hearing to take aim at Bessent’s directive to CFPB staff, saying that pausing all activities at the agency will lead to more unfair debanking.
“The freeze Secretary Bessent has put on the CFPB means more Americans across the country will be unfairly de-banked, and they will lose the one agency working to help them,” Warren said during the hearing.
Warren in particular seized on Trump’s criticism of Bank of America during a World Economic Forum panel in Davos, Switzerland, shortly after he assumed office.
“I hope [Brian Moynihan, CEO of Bank of America] start[s] opening [his] bank to conservatives, because many conservatives complain that the banks are not allowing them to do business within the bank, and that included a place called Bank of America,” Trump told Moynihan directly from the stage at the event.
Warren and others, including former CFPB Director Rohit Chopra, aimed to illustrate potential common ground on consumer protections in the weeks leading up to the inauguration. While he was still director, Chopra expressed encouragement about an idea Trump expressed on the campaign trail regarding the capping of credit card interest rates.
Warren is taking a similar tact, highlighting an instance in which the leader of a crypto firm claims he was debanked. But whether or not it combines into any meaningful change in the posture of the bureau is uncertain. Republicans have targeted the dismantling of the CFPB virtually since it was stood up in the aftermath of the 2007-08 financial crisis, and are poised to renew their efforts on the legislative front. Warren is largely credited with the bureau’s founding.
