Two senior leaders at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau announced their resignations this week as President Donald Trump’s administration aims to reorganize the apparently overstaffed and overfunded agency.
Lorelei Salas, the CFPB’s supervision director, and Eric Halperin, the agency’s enforcement director, issued separate memos on Tuesday, stepping down from their respective positions shortly after Mark Paoletta, a lawyer at the CFPB and the White House Office of Management and Budget, placed them on administrative leave.
‘I do not believe it is appropriate, nor lawful.’
The agency was created in 2011 by the Obama administration.
Russell Vought, the newly confirmed director of the OMB and the acting director of the CFPB, hit the ground running on Monday, instructing the CFBP’s 1,700 employees to “not come into the office” and “not perform any work tasks.”
For “any urgent matters,” workers were directed to first “get approval in writing.”
“Otherwise employees should stand down from performing any work task,” Vought declared.
Last week, Vought announced that he had halted the agency’s quarterly allocation from the Federal Reserve after learning that it had a “balance of $711,586,678.00” in its fund.
He wrote in a post on X, “Pursuant to the Consumer Financial Protection Act, I have notified the Federal Reserve that CFPB will not be taking its next draw of unappropriated funding because it is not ‘reasonably necessary’ to carry out its duties. The Bureau’s current balance of $711.6 million is in fact excessive in the current fiscal environment. This spigot, long contributing to CFPB’s unaccountability, is now being turned off.”
Vought called the CFPB “a woke & weaponized agency against disfavored industries and individuals.”
Salas explained in her resignation letter that the agency has “been instructed to stand down.”
“I do not believe it is appropriate, nor lawful, to stop all supervisory activities and examinations, and I cannot longer serve as the Supervision Director,” she wrote.
Halperin outlined the reason for his resignation, writing, “I don’t believe in these conditions I can effectively serve in my role, which is protecting American consumers.”
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