FILE PHOTO: A view shows a bronze seal beside a door at the U.S. Treasury building in Washington, U.S., January 20, 2023. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque/File Photo
WASHINGTON: The US Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s Washington headquarters will be closed for the coming week, according to a Sunday (Feb 9) internal email seen by Reuters, the latest escalation in the Trump administration’s efforts to neutralise the government watchdog created after the 2008 financial crash.
Lightning changes in agency policy also come as workers denounce what they say is a glaring conflict of interest because representatives of billionaire Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency have gained access to computer systems at an agency that would likely regulate one of his pending business ventures as well as its competitors.
The decision to shutter the Washington offices comes less than 24 hours after Russell Vought, President Donald Trump’s newly installed acting CFPB chief, suspended all activities, including supervision of companies overseen by the agency, and said he would zero out CFPB funding for the coming fiscal quarter, according to a memo seen by Reuters and an announcement.
Vought, who on Thursday became head of the White House Office of Management and Budget, has granted DOGE members administrative-level access to all agency IT systems, according to a person with knowledge of the matter.
In a Saturday missive, Vought ordered staff to “cease all supervision and examination activity”, going a step further than a directive issued last week by Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, whom Trump had briefly put in charge after firing Rohit Chopra.
The Office of Management and Budget did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the office closure but said earlier Sunday that Vought was now reviewing the CFPB’s supervisory activities, which OMB said had been “weaponized” and exceeded the agency’s legal mandate.
Vought has directed that the CFPB cease public communications. It did not respond to a request for comment.
The CFPB supervises consumer-facing financial companies like banks, title lenders, mortgage originators and cash transfer services to prevent unfair, deceptive and abusive practices and other predatory conduct that produced the toxic assets at the root of the 2008 crash.
Vought’s order leaves much of that business activity without federal government oversight.
The weekend moves continued a rapid advance by Trump and billionaire Elon Musk to remake the federal government and drew protests from agency workers on Saturday morning and condemnation from top Democratic lawmakers on Capitol Hill.
Musk, whose platform X is seeking to enter the consumer financial marketplace, has vowed to destroy the CFPB and union officials said on Friday that Musk was effectively seeking to seize control of his own regulator. Musk did not respond to requests for comment.
In a Sunday statement, Dennis Kelleher, head of Better Markets, which advocates for stricter government oversight of the financial sector, accused Trump of throwing his own voters “to the financial wolves”.
“This latest attempt to kill the consumer bureau is another slap in the face for all Americans who depend on basic financial products and services, but especially for those in the multi-racial working-class coalition of Americans that helped elect President Trump,” Kelleher said.
