Approximately two-thirds of Americans surveyed support the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). New polls It was released on Wednesday.
Approximately 67% of Americans said they support the consumer watchdog, including 60% of Republicans, 68% of independents and 84% of Democrats. The poll was commissioned by two nonprofit organizations supporting strict consumer finance regulations: Responsible Lending Centres and Americans for Financial Reform.
The latest poll comes amid growing concern that the Trump administration is planning to effectively dismantle consumer watchdogs.
Agency work has been on hold since early February, mostly since Russell ordered staff to stop from all work tasks. CFPB employees were told not to come to the agency headquarters and the building's lease was later cancelled.
The administration pointed to President Trump's decision to nominate Jonathan McCernan as director, pointed to plans to streamline the agency, and argued that it was not planning to eliminate the CFPB.
However, several current employees said last week in a court application that officials were told by the authorities that they were planning to exclude all but five employees and transfer the statutory necessary functions of the consumer watchdog to other agencies.
“The shutdown of the Consumer Bureau's administration will not be interrupted from the stage with Americans, beyond the political spectrum that this consumer watchdog agency wants to do its job,” the chairman of the Responsible Lending Center said in a statement.
“Consumer Affairs Bureau rules are popular for reducing the costs of overdraft fees, reducing the burden of medical debt, and tracking gaps in lending for small businesses, and Congress should put these rules into effect,” he added.
Seven in 10 Americans support the CFPB rules by limiting bank overdraft fees for $5, while 66% support the agency's measures to ban medical debt from their credit reports, polls found. Approximately 53% of respondents also support rules that require banks to track small business loans.
The House Financial Services Committee is scheduled to consider Wednesday's resolution to overturn the CFPB's overdraft rules. The French Hill Rep. (R-Ark.), a chair on the panel, condemned the rules in his opening remarks as “false,” claiming that it would “reduce consumer choices, deny this necessary service to citizens, and suppress innovation.”
The poll was conducted on February 21-23 by a bipartisan team of Lake Research Partners and Chesapeake Beach Consulting with 1,029 US adults, with an error of 3.1 percentage points.
Updated at 2:21 PM EST.
