If Trump really wants to help working people he won’t kill this federal agency

When a bunch of billionaires tell you they know what’s best for you, hang onto your wallet. Over the past few weeks, Republican politicians and billionaires have come out swinging with lies about the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, hoping they can pave the way to “delete”This link opens in new window or tab. the agency. But if you have a checking account, credit card, mortgage, or student loan, you might want to know what it could mean for you if the CFPB disappears. That’s the dangerous promise This link opens in new window or tab.of Project 2025.

Suppose you take out a car loan with Wells Fargo. Month after month you make your payments, but the bank messes up. Maybe they piled on fees you didn’t owe or charged you the wrong interest rate. On their end, it looks like you’ve fallen behind on your payments, so they repossess your carThis link opens in new window or tab.. Now you can’t get to work or take your kids to school. What are your options? You can’t afford to sue. The police won’t help. Before the CFPB, about all you could do was reach out to the bank’s customer service and beg them to solve the problem, get left on hold, transferred from department to department, and end up nowhere. That was it — until the CFPB.

That’s not a hypothetical. The CFPB received thousands of complaints that Wells Fargo had unlawfully repossessed This link opens in new window or tab.cars and wrongfully foreclosed This link opens in new window or tab.on homes. Wells Fargo illegally injured the owners of more than 16 million accountsThis link opens in new window or tab. — you may have been one of them. That’s where the CFPB comes in. The agency took on the giant bank, stopped the repos, and ordered the bank to pay backThis link opens in new window or tab. more than $2 billion to those customers who had been wronged. No need to file a lawsuit. No need to spend hours on the phone. That’s the power of having a cop on the beat.

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