After a catastrophic first 100 days in office, during which President Trump has wrecked the economy and put the United States on track toward a recession, on Wednesday, Committee Republicans doubled down on this dangerous agenda by voting to advance the Billionaire Tax Cut bill out of Committee. This bill is riddled with harmful, deregulatory, and flat-out dangerous provisions. Not only will this bill hand billionaires like Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and Mark Zuckerberg a massive $7 trillion tax cut, but it also slashes $880 billion in Medicaid and funding for food stamps. At a time when our nation is facing a worsening housing and climate crisis, this bill guts funding for affordable, climate-resilient housing.
And that’s not all. These sweeping deregulatory measures defund the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau which was created after the financial crisis of 2008 to protect working-class families from financial fraud and abuse and has saved consumers $21 billion since. It abolishes oversight bodies like the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board, established to regulate auditors after two major accounting scandals and the Financial Stability Oversight Council (FSOC), and Office of Financial Research (OFR), leaving millions of American families vulnerable to a financial crash.
Committee Democrats offered nearly 40 measures to prevent some of the worst harms in this bill. Committee Republicans unanimously rejected every single one, refusing not only to support these measures, but to even explain their opposition to the American people. Here are the amendments Committee Republicans rejected:
Protecting the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and Safeguarding American Families from Financial Abuse
Amendment from Rep. Waters. This amendment would prevent the CFPB rollbacks and funding cuts from taking effect unless Treasury certifies that the bill will not lead to increased fraud for veterans or prevent harmed veterans from getting prompt remediation.
Amendment from Rep. Velázquez. This amendment would exempt from the bill’s CFPB's funding cut to ensure the CFPB has resources necessary for CFPB to fully enforce all regulations it has issued to protect consumers.
Amendment from Rep. Lynch. This amendment would provide an exemption to CFPB’s funding cut to ensure they have sufficient funding to protect servicemembers.
Amendment from Rep. Foster. This amendment would provide an exemption to CFPB’s funding cut to ensure they have sufficient funding to fully implement their Sec. 1033 rule to promote open banking and data privacy.
Amendment from Rep. Foster. This amendment would ensure CFPB has sufficient funding to ensure consumers are protected from unfair, deceptive, or abusive acts or practices (UDAAP) related to Artificial Intelligence (AI) and other emerging technologies used in consumer finance.
Amendment from Rep. Foster. This amendment would ensure CFPB has sufficient funding to operate the consumer complaint database and ensure financial firms respond to complaints.
Amendment from Rep. Liccardo. This amendment would ensure that reforms to undermine CFPB’s Civil Penalty Fund will be blocked if the CFPB certifies that the changes would prevent consumers harmed by corporate malfeasance from being remediated.
Amendment from Rep. Himes. This amendment would ensure harmed servicemembers and veterans would still be compensated through CFPB’s Civil Penalty Fund if the financial firm has closed, went bankrupt, or is otherwise unable to remediate such harmed consumers.
Amendment from Rep. Williams (GA).This amendment blocks the White House from undermining CFPB's independence by prohibiting its ability to review or modify CFPB’s budget or proposed rules and guidance before it is finalized.
Amendment from Rep. Bynum. This amendment would ensure CFPB has sufficient funding for the purpose of ensuring student borrowers are protected.
Amendment from Rep. Bynum. This amendment ensures that CFPB has sufficient funding for the purpose of implementing interpretative guidance on how payment consumer protections apply to emerging digital payment mechanisms, including those offered through video gaming platforms.
Amendment from Rep. Bynum. This amendment would prevent the CFPB rollbacks and funding cuts from taking effect unless Treasury certifies that fees and other financing costs will be reduced for every consumer financial product.
Amendment from Rep. Pressley. This amendment would maintain CFPB’s robust funding and replace their funding mechanism with industry assessments, including on megabanks, big tech payment providers, and payday lenders.
Amendment from Rep. Pressley. This amendment would maintain CFPB’s robust funding and replace their funding mechanism with assessments on financial firms that broke consumer financial protection laws.
Protecting Investors from Massive Financial Scandals
Amendment from Rep. Bynum. This amendment would make the effective date of the PCAOB related section effective only upon certification by the SEC that retirement savers would not be exposed to greater risk, given that PCAOB will no longer inspect the auditors and public company audits.
Amendment from Rep. Lynch. This amendment allow FSOC to study the effects of Trump's ownership of a crypto company that is creating a stablecoin and crypto exchange, and given his government role, whether such an arrangement could harm competition and financial stability.
Amendment from Rep. Waters. This amendment authorizes the SEC $3.2 billion, to be offset by fees on well-known seasoned issuers (large public companies), to carry out the duties that PCAOB would now no longer do, including auditor registration, inspections, standard setting, etc.
Amendment from Rep. Sherman. Strikes Sec. 50002, to not dismantle the PCAOB.
Protecting Americans from a Disastrous Economic Recession
Amendment from Rep. Pressley. This amendment would require FSOC and OFR to study DOGE cuts and their negative effect on consumer harm and financial stability.
Amendment from Rep. Pressley. This amendment would require FSOC member agencies to report to Congress on the types and amounts of sensitive data that DOGE has had access to, and for FSOC to assess whether that information sharing has undermined data privacy, competition, cybersecurity, or other financial stability concerns.
Amendment from Rep. Waters. This amendment would allow FSOC to investigate the President and other government officials who are gaining financial benefit from their ownership and marketing of crypto products for conflicts of interest that may harm financial stability.
Amendment from Rep. Waters. This amendment would allow FSOC to monitor risks to financial stability arising from the government potentially requiring the use of particular stablecoins and other digital assets to contract with the government.
Amendment from Rep. Foster. This amendment would require an FSOC and OFR study on the financial stability impact of the use of social media and other unofficial channels, including those personally owned by the President, to convey major policy initiatives, like on tariffs or attacking the independence of the Fed.
Amendment from Rep. Vargas. This amendment would require an FSOC and OFR study on the impact that the President's attempt to undermine the independence of the Federal Reserve has on the economy, price stability, maximum employment, and dollar primacy.
Amendment from Rep. Tlaib. This amendment would prevent these FSC provisions from taking effect if the government extends or expands tax cuts for wealthy individuals or large corporations.
Amendment from Rep. Pettersen. This amendment would prevent these FSC provisions from taking effect if the government cuts funding for Medicaid, Social Security, or Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).
Amendment from Rep. Liccardo. This amendment would require FSOC and OFR to study how chaotic tariff plans and a global trade war can harm the economy, financial system and dollar primacy.
Amendment from Rep. Bynum. This amendment would require the Fed to conduct a study on the impact tariffs have on the cost of goods and services for consumers.
Preserving Affordable, Climate-Resilient Housing
Amendment from Rep. Waters. This amendment would provide over $150 billion in robust new investment in housing to address the crisis.
Amendment from Rep. Waters. This amendment would provide full funding for 60,000 Emergency Housing Vouchers.
Amendment from Rep. Velázquez. This amendment would strike Section 50001 and replace this section with funding to address the public housing capital backlog.
Amendment from Rep. Green. This amendment would strike Section 50001 and replace this section with Rep. Green’s Reforming Disaster Recovery Act.
Amendment from Rep. Williams. This amendment would strike Section 5001 and replace it with funding for the HOME and CDBG programs to build, rehabilitate, and preserve affordable and resilient housing to bring down house prices and reduce the cost of post-disaster recovery efforts.
Amendment from Rep. Pettersen. This amendment would create an exception to the requirement of transferring excess funds from the civil penalty fund to Treasury. Any remaining amounts in the fund that come from enforcement actions for violations of the Military Lending Act shall be transferred to the Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Department of Veteran Affairs HUD-VASH program.
Amendment from Rep. Liccardo. This amendment would provide that Section 50001 would not take place if the HUD Secretary determines that the rescission of funds would undermine efforts to reduce utility bills to tenants and landlords in public housing.
Amendment from Rep. Liccardo. This amendment would provide that Section 50001 would not take place if the HUD Secretary determines that the rescission of funds would reduce funding for affordable housing projects to protect against natural disasters in disaster-prone areas.
