The National Treasury Employees Union, which represents federal employees in 37 federal agencies and offices, has filed suit against Russell Vought, the director of the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB), over actions he has taken to scale back the activities of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) since being appointed as its acting director on Friday.
The suits, reported by The Wall Street Journal, come from a union that represents CFPB workers. They take aim at both Vought’s order to stop all work at the bureau and close its headquarters, as well as at Vought’s allowance of data access to the “Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE),” an unofficial White House task force led by billionaire Elon Musk.
In the case of the DOGE suit, the union argues that its members could suffer “irreparable harm“ without the sought relief, according to reporting from NBC News.
“These employees face irreparable harm to their privacy interests if their employee information is improperly accessed and/or disseminated by individuals associated with DOGE,” the suit explained, according to the report. “Once an employee’s personnel information is improperly disclosed, the harm to the employee cannot be undone.”
The suits were filed on Sunday. One targets Vought’s specific stop-work order at the CFPB, while the second targets DOGE in an effort to secure the personal information of CFPB staffers from being accessed by bureaucrats. On Saturday, Vought ordered CFPB staffers to give access to DOGE officials.
One lawsuit alleges that Vought’s actions to stop work at the CFPB violate the U.S. Constitution, particularly the separation of powers clause, since the order prevents the bureau from carrying out legislative mandates from Congress.
“It is substantially likely that these initial directives are a precursor to a purge of CFPB’s workforce, which is now prohibited from fulfilling the agency’s statutory mission,” one union attorney wrote.
On Monday, inquiries to Vought were directed to Mark Paoletta, the OMB’s general counsel. Paoletta emailed the CPFB enforcement division, reminding them of Vought’s directive and saying he would be implementing new enforcement priorities at the agency in the coming days, according to a copy of the email reviewed by the Journal.
“Failure to abide by these instructions constitutes insubordination and we will take appropriate personnel action,” Paoletta said in the email, according to the Journal’s reporting.
