National Consumer Law Center

"The Trump Administration is trying to eliminate the #CFPB and is now letting this company off the hook to exploit more consumers by trapping them into paying for expensive and unnecessary subscription products,” said Chi Chi Wu, senior attorney at the National Consumer Law Center. “This sends a dangerous signal that the Administration is willing to allow free rein to the oligopoly of companies that constitute the single worst source of complaints and ruin the economic reputation and lives of so many consumers.” #ProtectConsumers

"Voters in the last election expressed their dismay with high prices, yet the Administration is stopping the essential work to stop corporate abuses that take billions from people every year," said Lauren Saunders, associate director of the National Consumer Law Center. "The cases dismissed today actually underscore why the CFPB's work is so essential to investigate practices that are draining hard-earned money from the pockets of everyday people." #ProtectConsumers #DefendCFPB via NPR

“The Trump Administration and Elon Musk are showing us exactly what it means not to have ordinary people protected by a strong Consumer Financial Protection Bureau – they are dismissing enforcement cases that sought to return billions to working families harmed by corporations accused of egregious conduct that violated the law,” said Lauren Saunders, associate director of the National Consumer Law Center. “On top of the stop work order and firing of CFPB workers doing their jobs, this sends a dangerous message to corporate America that financial fraud and abuse will go unchecked. We must preserve a strong, independent, and functional CFPB to stand up to corporate bullies.” #ProtectConsumers #DefendCFPB

Without a registered deed or legal proof of ownership, heirs property owners are limited in their ability to manage their home. But some studies estimate that 𝐡𝐞𝐢𝐫𝐬 𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐭𝐲 𝐦𝐚𝐤𝐞𝐬 𝐮𝐩 𝐦𝐨𝐫𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐧 𝐡𝐚𝐥𝐟 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐥 𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐭𝐲 𝐨𝐰𝐧𝐞𝐝 𝐛𝐲 𝐁𝐥𝐚𝐜𝐤 𝐀𝐦𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐧𝐬. NCLC's 2024 report highlights a wide range of laws and policies adopted in jurisdictions across the country and provides recommendations for states to tackle home loss by either protecting, resolving, or preventing heirs property. #FairHousing #RacialWealthGap #BlackHistoryMonth #ProtectConsumers

As tens of millions of Americans are driven into debt by medical bills they don't understand or can't afford, many are reassessing their inclination to look to free markets rather than the government. "I think most people look at this and say the market is broken, and that's why they're willing for someone, anyone, to step in," said Bob Ward, whose firm, Fabrizio Ward, polled for Trump's 2024 campaign. "The deck is stacked against folks." #MedicalDebt #ProtectConsumers #DefendCFPB via: NPR Noam Levey

With the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau under a stop-work order and unable – and apparently unwilling – to defend a rule removing medical debt from credit reports, a coalition of affected consumers and groups are asking for permission to defend the rule in federal court. NCLC is representing a Texas truck driver and a DC resident, as well as the nonprofit groups Tzedek DC and New Mexico Center on Law and Poverty, in a motion to intervene in a lawsuit filed by Consumer Data Industry Association and Cornerstone Credit Union League, trade associations of credit reporting agencies and credit unions, respectively. CDIA and Cornerstone had filed suit in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas seeking to overturn the medical debt rule -- a lifeline for 15 million people. https://lnkd.in/eAq5WbfG

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau dismissed, with prejudice, an enforcement action that it had filed last year against SoLo Funds for deceiving borrowers and illegally extracting fees. Under the previous administration, the CFPB had charged SoLo Funds with advertising 0% APR and “no interest” loans but deploying digital dark patterns that resulted in almost every borrower paying one or more fees. “States now have to pick up the pieces. No state should tolerate a company flagrantly deceiving borrowers and ignoring state rate caps and licensing laws," said Lauren Saunders, associate director at the National Consumer Law Center.  https://lnkd.in/eBCeDEXu

“We are hoping that these are broadly popular measures, that Republicans will understand that their voters don’t want banks to gouge them with excessive, back-end overdraft fees,” among other charges, said Lauren Saunders, associate director of the National Consumer Law Center. “We’re hopeful, but who knows.” #ProtectConsumers #DefendCFPB via USA TODAY

Carla Leticia Sanchez-Adams, a senior attorney at NCLC, said stricter rules of liability would put some of the onus for these crimes on the companies that help facilitate them. She referenced telecommunications companies that let scam calls or texts slip through, or social media companies like Meta, that allow for scam products to be sold on Facebook Marketplace. “Part of the reason why [fraud is] successful is because of the lack of protections in some of these systems and the lack of incentives to make the systems more protective,” Sanchez-Adams said. #ProtectConsumers Payments Dive

This week, NCLC, along with Prison Policy Initiative and expert Stephen Raher, submitted comments on the Federal Bureau of Prisons’ updated proposed rules for its Inmate Financial Responsibility Program (IFRP). These rules are purported to be aimed at ultra-wealthy people in federal prisons who amassed unusually large amounts of money in their commissary accounts while failing to pay legal fees and restitution. However, they’re written so broadly that they’d make the lives of the vast majority of incarcerated people and their loved ones, who are generally poorer and from disadvantaged backgrounds, much more difficult and threaten their success after their release from prison. #CriminalJustice #ProtectConsumers