Chairwoman Maxine Waters Urges Biden to Rescind the CFPB's Debt Collection Rule

On Friday, Representative Maxine Waters (D-CA-43)—the Chairwoman of the House Financial Services Committee—sent a letter to President-elect Biden urging him and Vice President-elect Harris to rescind the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's recently-released final debt collection rule and to take several other actions.

The 45-page-long letter covers a wide range of topics. Under the topic of consumer protection during the COVID-19 pandemic, the letter states that Biden should fire Director Kathy Kraninger and put in place a Bureau leadership that would "aggressively protect consumers." Specifically related to debt collection, the letter states:

• The CFPB should rescind a recent rule that would allow debt collectors to harass consumers over email or text, and instead bolster consumer protections against abusive debt collection practices.
• Issue a Presidential executive order directing the Treasury and other agencies to immediately suspend the collection of debts owed by consumers to the federal government until after the pandemic ends.

The letter also urges Biden to take a strong stance toward promoting diversity and inclusion in the financial services industry as well as in the industry's regulators. In support of this, the letter suggests that the new administration:

Require disclosure of public companies and regulated entities of their boards’ diversity, including by approving proposals by national exchanges to change their listing standards to require such disclosure, as well as setting minimum board diversity levels.

[article_ad]