WASHINGTON, D.C. - Today, Congresswoman Maxine Waters (D-CA), the top Democrat on the House Financial Services Committee, delivered the following opening statement during a full Committee hearing entitled, “The Semi-Annual Report of the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection.”
Mr. Vought, for a year and a half, Committee Democrats have demanded answers while you have refused to provide them. We sent you letters, requested briefings, and repeatedly called for this hearing. Instead of being proud of your work, you have been hiding while unlawfully trying, and thankfully failing, to dismantle the nation's top consumer watchdog. I’ve never delighted in someone’s failure more than I have delighted in yours.
Next week marks the 15th anniversary of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau opening its doors. It was created after the 2008 financial crisis when millions of Americans were scammed out of their homes. Congress wanted working families to have someone on their side.
And until you showed up, the Bureau was on their side. CFPB returned $21 billion to millions of consumers cheated by banks, mortgage servicers, payday lenders, credit reporting companies, debt collectors, and others. Because of CFPB’s hardworking public servants — some of them are in the audience — the agency held bad actors accountable and got justice for Americans.
But not under your watch. Mr. Vought, you’ve directed CFPB to drop enforcement actions even when the bad actor offered to compensate victims. You’ve blocked billions of dollars from being returned to harmed American consumers. You’ve even been terrible for the financial services industry, denying or throwing out basic guidance and safeguards industry had asked for. And, your message to Wall Street is clear: you are defunding the police and you’re breaking the law to do it.
Consumer complaints about financial practices have exploded, with more complaints filed under your watch than cumulatively filed since 2011. That is not a coincidence. It’s because of you.
What is astonishing is that many of my Republican colleagues continue attacking the CFPB even as they tell their constituents to ask the agency to resolve disputes with companies. Republicans secretly know the CFPB works because their constituents have benefited from it, but they are too scared to admit it. But Americans know the truth. Recent polling shows that 80% of midterm voters support the CFPB.
If going after consumers were not bad enough, at the White House, you’ve also gone after Community Development Financial Institutions (I’m talking about CDFIs, and you know what I’m talking about), including hundreds of community banks and credit unions, and after the courts rejected your blatantly illegal attempt to cancel grants Congress authorized for non-profit organizations, you are again violating the law with your new rule proposal.
Committee Democrats refuse to stand by. We have led multiple amicus briefs defending the CFPB and Congress's constitutional authority to create it, helping secure numerous court victories that stopped your efforts to dismantle the agency, starve it of its funding, and carry out unlawful mass firings. Those victories have kept the Bureau operating.
So let me be clear. Today is about holding you accountable for ignoring the law – don’t look surprised; you know what I’m talking about.
I yield back.
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