Attorney General Bonta to U.S. Supreme Court: CFPB Is Constitutional, Too Much at Stake for Consumers

OAKLAND — California Attorney General Rob Bonta today issued the following statement in response to the U.S. Supreme Court's decision to grant the Consumer Protection Financial Bureau’s (CFPB) request that the court review a decision by the Fifth Circuit finding that CFPB’s funding scheme violates the Apportionment Clause:

“The CFPB plays a critical role in advancing consumer protections and regulating the financial services industry,” said Attorney General Bonta. “I am pleased that the Supreme Court will review the misguided Fifth Court decision, which if allowed to stand threatens to upend over a decade of important enforcement and regulatory work by the CFPB and throw the consumer financial markets into turmoil. With consumers already struggling to make ends meet, I urge the Supreme Court to overturn the confusion and regulatory chaos caused by the Fifth Circuit's decision. CFPB’s funding structure and work remain constitutional, a critical partner to the states, and an important safeguard to protect consumers from predatory practices.”

In the wake of the 2008 financial crisis, Congress established the CFPB as the nation’s consumer watchdog and, critically, as an independent agency with the authority to issue rules and enforce federal consumer protection laws. The agency serves an important role by safeguarding American consumers from predatory, unfair, and deceptive practices in the market for financial products and services. Attorney General Bonta, as part of a coalition of 22 attorneys general, urged the U.S. Supreme Court to grant the agency’s petition for review of a Fifth Circuit case filed by a coalition of predatory lenders. The states argued that the CFPB has served as an invaluable enforcement partner to state attorneys general and that the Fifth Circuit’s reasoning threatens to invalidate past CFPB actions to the detriment of both the consumers protected by these actions and the financial service providers who have relied on these actions to guide their conduct.