League Monitoring Long-Awaited Supreme Court Case That May Decide CFPB's Future

Your League will monitor the long-awaited case before the U.S. Supreme Court that may well decide the future of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

SCOTUS on Tuesday will weigh a ruling that said the agency’s funding system violates a constitutional provision requiring a congressional appropriation for government spending. The CFPB isn’t subject to the congressional appropriations process and instead draws funding for operations from the Federal Reserve. In fiscal year 2022, the agency received $641.5 million in funding. The funding cap for CFPB is $734 million.

Your League supports subjecting the CFPB to the regular Congressional appropriations process, as well as the transition of the CFPB’s leadership structure from the current single-director model to a multi-member commission.

“Credit unions are too often swept into one-size-fits-all regulation by the CFPB that harms credit union members and restricts credit unions’ ability to provide consumer-friendly products and services to their members,” said League President/CEO Carrie Hunt. “We supported efforts to challenge the CFPB in the courts and we remain supportive of legislative efforts to reform the CFPB and increase its transparency and accountability to both financial institutions and consumers.”

The American Association of Credit Union Leagues (AACUL), the Credit Union National Association (CUNA), and the National Association of Federally-Insured Credit Unions (NAFCU) jointly filed an amicus brief with the Court, which argued that the Supreme Court should uphold the lower court’s decision that the CFPB’s funding scheme violates the Appropriations Clause. If the court’s ruling results in the agency being rendered operationally defunct, the groups asked that the Court stay its judgment three to six months, allowing Congress to adopt a measure to fund the Bureau.

It may well be months before the high court issues a ruling in this case.