WSJ Editorial Board: Why Is Rohit Chopra Still Employed at the CFPB?
“If Mr. Chopra is allowed to stay in power, he’ll end up being a source of internal opposition to Mr. Trump’s deregulatory agenda.”
WASHINGTON, D.C. – The Wall Street Journal Editorial Board in a new piece reiterates the need for President Trump to fire Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) Director Rohit Chopra – an appointee of former President Joe Biden and a protégé of Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) – as he stands to block the Trump Administration’s deregulatory agenda:
“President Trump this week ordered a rollback of burdensome Biden regulations and signaled employee layoffs. Hear, hear. But then why hasn’t he fired Rohit Chopra, the Elizabeth Warren protege who runs the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau?
“Keeping him on would undermine Mr. Trump’s agenda. Mr. Chopra didn’t receive a single Republican Senate vote when he was confirmed in September 2021.
“The list of Mr. Chopra’s regulatory assaults on business is long [… ] If Mr. Chopra is allowed to stay in power, he’ll end up being a source of internal opposition to Mr. Trump’s deregulatory agenda. His populist soundings on finance mask a progressive who dislikes markets and business.”
To read the full piece, click HERE or see below.
Why Is Rohit Chopra Still Employed at the CFPB?
By the Editorial Board
The Wall Street Journal
Jan. 23, 2025
President Trump this week ordered a rollback of burdensome Biden regulations and signaled employee layoffs. Hear, hear. But then why hasn’t he fired Rohit Chopra, the Elizabeth Warren protege who runs the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau?
Unlike other Biden appointees, Mr. Chopra refused to resign after Mr. Trump took office. The Dodd-Frank Act gives the CFPB director a five-year term, which ends in October 2026, though he can be removed by the President at any time. Our sources say he’s sought to ingratiate himself with JD Vance in hopes of serving out his term.
Keeping him on would undermine Mr. Trump’s agenda. Mr. Chopra didn’t receive a single Republican Senate vote when he was confirmed in September 2021. He soon launched a coup against the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. Chair and Trump appointee, Jelena McWilliams, as we chronicled.
As CFPB director, Mr. Chopra sits on the board of the FDIC, which regulates banks along with the Federal Reserve and Comptroller of the Currency. He has encroached on those and other agencies’ turf in part by pushing overreaching rules such as revisions to the Community Reinvestment Act, which a federal court blocked.
The list of Mr. Chopra’s regulatory assaults on business is long. He has sought to impose de facto diversity quotas on mortgage lenders under the guise of preventing red-lining. He has used the Fair Credit Reporting Act, which regulates how credit agencies collect and use consumer data, to regulate employer background checks and employee-monitoring software to make it harder to fire unproductive workers.
Last autumn he promulgated an “open banking” rule that requires banks and credit card companies to share customer data at no cost with a third party such as a fintech app upon a customer’s request. The rule is a gift to con artists. Although Mr. Chopra pretends to be a friend of small business and startups, most of his enforcement actions have been against small companies.
One of his first acts was to shut down the lending operations of LendUpLoans, a fintech startup backed by such venture investors as PayPal Holdings and Andreessen Horowitz. Marc Andreessen recently said the CFPB is “terrorizing” tech firms and startups trying to compete with big banks.
Two months ago Mr. Chopra extended CFPB oversight of digital payment apps and wallets including for crypto. He claimed that “digital payment apps can be used to defraud older adults and active duty servicemembers,” which is ironic since his open banking rule would facilitate such fraud.
In an effort to keep his job, Mr. Chopra is purporting to defend conservatives and crypto enthusiasts who complain about being “debanked.” But banking groups say this happens under pressure from bank examiners, including those at the FDIC.
Mr. Chopra did nothing to stop the Biden Administration’s Operation Chokepoint against lending to crypto companies. He has spent his tenure advancing progressive hobbyhorses, including rules that ban medical debt on consumer credit reports and cap bank overdraft fees. Both exceed his authority and encourage moral hazard.
If Mr. Chopra is allowed to stay in power, he’ll end up being a source of internal opposition to Mr. Trump’s deregulatory agenda. His populist soundings on finance mask a progressive who dislikes markets and business.
