Current Events > Color Me Shocked! SCOTUS Is Protecting the CFPB

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https://www.npr.org/2024/05/16/1251782953/supreme-court-cfpb

The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday upheld the structure of the Consumer Financial protection Bureau, the watchdog agency set up by Congress after the 2008 financial crash to protect consumers from predatory and deceptive practices by financial institutions.

The vote was 7-to-2. Writing for the court majority, Justice Clarence Thomas focused on the text and history of the appropriations clause of the Constitution, all of which, he said, give Congress broad discretion and flexibility as to how it authorizes funds to be drawn from the Treasury. He noted that the very first Congress allowed several executive agencies to fund themselves from revenue they collected, much like the CFPB does today in getting a capped amount from fees collected by the Federal Reserve system.

Justices Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch dissented. They said that the court had turned the appropriations clause of the constitution into a "minor vestige," allowing the CFPB to "bankroll its own agenda without any congressional oversight."

Congress created the CFPB after the 2008 financial crash to protect consumers from what were seen as predatory and deceptive practices by financial institutions. Since then, the bureau has established consumer protections for transactions ranging from mortgages to credit cards. But payday lenders have, for years, fought regulations that would limit excessive fees charged on small loans of just a few hundred dollars fees that often end up costing people thousands of dollars.

Then, last year, the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the CFPB's structure is unconstitutional because, instead of an annual congressional appropriation, Congress set the agency's funding at a capped amount that comes from banking fees paid to the Federal Reserve System.

The government appealed to the Supreme Court because many other agencies are similarly funded, including the Federal Reserve itself; the FDIC, which insures bank deposits; the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, which charters and regulates all national banks; and potentially even Social Security and Medicare, which are funded by a specific tax.

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Theres no real benefit to Republicans for killing it. Plus Republicans in Congress can continue bitching this way.

People better vote blue. While the Supreme Court is 6/3, two flips can turn it to a Democrat court. Thomas and Alito could be on their way out any day. Once they go, the Supreme Court can flip. We just need Democrat leadership for when they finally croak.

Get Trump in there and either of them retire to let them get another shithead Republican in those seats and the courts last chance is gone.

It still blows my mind that the judicial branch is trying to act like a weird combo of the legislative and executive branch. This is not what the court was made for.

Sayoria posted...

People better vote blue. While the Supreme Court is 6/3, two flips can turn it to a Democrat court. Thomas and Alito could be on their way out any day. Once they go, the Supreme Court can flip. We just need Democrat leadership for when they finally croak.

Get Trump in there and either of them retire to let them get another shithead Republican in those seats and the courts last chance is gone.

If we get control of the House and 66 votes in the Senate we can hit reset on the whole group.

Neither party will have 66 votes in the senate

Irony posted...

Neither party will have 66 votes in the senate

Doesnt have to be one party. Once Trump implodes I can forsee a very real scenario where he splits from them and a quarter of the Republicans are free agents.

Yes extremely high threshold but it would save us thirty years of rebuilding the court.