Cara Peterson, the acting head of enforcement for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, quit on Tuesday after sending a fiery email to her department denouncing the Trump administration’s efforts to gut the watchdog agency.
“I have served under every director and acting director in the bureau’s history and never before have I seen the ability to perform our core mission so under attack,” wrote Ms. Peterson, who had worked at the agency since its creation in 2011.
The consumer bureau, the only federal regulator and enforcer of consumer financial protection laws, has been fighting for its survival since President Trump installed Russell T. Vought, the White House budget office director, as the agency’s acting leader in early February. Congress created the bureau, and only Congress can close it, but Mr. Vought has halted nearly all of its work and sought to fire 90 percent of its staff. Court orders have temporarily paused the firings, but much of the agency’s staff is on administrative leave.
Ms. Peterson became the agency’s acting head of enforcement after the previous enforcement leader, Eric Halperin, resigned in February with his own scathing email. Since then, Mr. Vought has abandoned and dismissed most of the bureau’s enforcement cases, including major lawsuits against large banks over fraud on their payments apps and deceptive tactics that deprived customers of higher interest rates on their savings accounts.
He also terminated several settlement deals, allowing companies to keep money they had agreed to pay in penalties and customer refunds. Last month the agency terminated an order that required Toyota to refund $48 million to customers the carmaker had prevented from canceling unwanted insurance products.
“It is clear that the bureau’s current leadership has no intention to enforce the law in any meaningful way,” Ms. Peterson wrote in her farewell email. “While I wish you all the best, I worry for American consumers.”
Stacy Cowley is a business reporter who writes about a broad array of topics related to consumer finance, including student debt, the banking industry and small business.
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