Project 2025 architect Russell Vought, now Trump’s director of the Office of Management & Budget, sent an email ordering the near-total shutdown of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB).
The order bars the agency from continuing to investigate (or launching new investigations into) any corporations suspected of unfair, deceptive, or abusive practices that harm American consumers. Vought also instructed the CFPB to suspend work on proposed rules and refrain from implementing new rules that have yet to take effect.
According to the Associated Press, “the email also ordered the bureau to ‘cease all supervision and examination activity.’”
After sending the order, Vought announced on social media that the CFPB would not withdraw any funding approved by Congress from the Federal Reserve.
The next day – Sunday, February 9, 2025 – the CFPB’s homepage goes offline, and the headquarters in Washington, D.C. is closed for a week with all employees told to work from home.
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau was created to hold malicious corporations (such as Trump University) accountable and prevent another crisis like the 2008 stock market crash.
The CFPB says that it has obtained nearly $20 billion in financial relief for U.S. consumers since its founding in the form of canceled debts, compensation, and reduced loans. Last month, the bureau sued Capital One for allegedly misleading consumers about its offerings for high-interest savings accounts — and “cheating” customers out of more than $2 billion in lost interest payments as a result, the bureau said.
The Associated Press
