WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Jerry Moran (R-Kan.) – member of the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs and member of the Senate Committee on Appropriations – cosponsored the CFPB Accountability Act of 2019. This legislation would hold the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) accountable to the American people by bringing the agency under the Congressional appropriations process.

“With a substantial budget and broad regulatory authority, the American people deserve to have the CFPB under Congress’ watchful eye,” said Sen. Moran. “Additional oversight is an essential component of Congressional influence on the CFPB to make markets for consumer financial products and services work better for our economy without partisan politics shifting the agency’s mission with each change in administration. I urge my colleagues to support this sensible measure to make certain that members of the House and Senate have the ability to reign in the CFPB when necessary.”

In 2010, under a Democrat-controlled Congress, President Obama signed into law the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, otherwise known as “Dodd-Frank.” Dodd-Frank established the CFPB with a budget at as much as 12 percent of the Federal Reserve’s annual operating expense, roughly $680 million, without any Congressional oversight of the agency’s funds. The CFPB Accountability Act of 2019 would subject the CFPB to the annual Congressional appropriations process, like other regulators including the Securities Exchange Commission, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, and the Federal Trade Commission, and provide oversight for an agency that has evaded Congressional review since it was created.

The CFPB Accountability Act of 2019 was authored by U.S. Senator David Perdue (R-Ga.) and is also cosponsored by U.S. Senators Ben Sasse (R-Neb.), Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), Ted Cruz (R-Texas), John Hoeven (R-N.D.), Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.), Joni Ernst (R-Iowa), Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.), Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-Miss.), Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), James Lankford (R-Okla.), Mike Rounds (R-S.D.), Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), John Kennedy (R-La.), John Boozman (R-Ark.), John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) and Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska).

Full text of the legislation can be found here.