Arizona Attorney General suing Trump admin over defunding consumer property protection agency

PHOENIX — Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes announced on Monday her office is suing the Trump administration for its decision to strip funds from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB).

Mayes and other coalition members alleged in the lawsuit that if Russel Vought, the current acting director of CFPB, does not request funding from the Federal Reserve, it “will have devastating impacts on consumers and severely disrupt states’ consumer protection efforts,” according to a press release.

The lawsuit also claimed that if Vought does not fund the CFPB soon, the agency will run out of money next month. Further, Mayes and the coalition argue that Vought is violating “the law and the Constitution” by not seeking “to collect and process consumer complaints and share that complaint data with states.”

Vought was accused of not requesting any federal funding due to his stance in November that the CFPB can only earn funds via Federal Reserve “profits” that “he asserted are currently nonexistent.”

The CFPB, which was introduced out of the Great Recession in 2011, has reimbursed more than 205 million Americans with more than $21 billion of improperly taken property, according to the release.

“Deliberately starving this agency of funding leaves consumers at risk of fraud, predatory lending and abusive financial practices,” Mayes said. “My office is taking action to protect consumers from this reckless and unlawful action.”

Mayes emphasized the CFPB’s role as the only federal agency with the authority “to supervise the nation’s largest banks” in complying with consumer financial protection laws.

Through the lawsuit, Mayes and the coalition of 21 other attorneys general want a court order against the Trump administration to require the CFPB “to fulfill its duties under the law.”

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