Dive Brief:

• The White House on Tuesday nominated Stuart Levenbach to be director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, a bureau spokesperson confirmed Wednesday.
• It’s a purely technical appointment intended to extend Russ Vought’s tenure as acting director, the spokesperson said. Levenbach is associate director of natural resources, energy, science and water at the Office of Management and Budget, which Vought leads. Levenbach also serves as an aide to Vought.
• According to the Federal Vacancies Reform Act, a person can serve in an acting role atop an agency for 210 days, if it’s a role subject to presidential appointment and Senate confirmation. But that person’s tenure can be extended if the president nominates another person for the position. Vought was named acting CFPB director Feb. 7.

Dive Insight:

Additionally, Geof Gradler was named deputy director of the CFPB. He’s a former lobbyist who joined the bureau about four months ago, according to his LinkedIn profile. 

The CFPB spokesperson declined to comment on the fate of the agency, or whether the bureau intended to make a similar move in another 210 days. 

Vought said last month on a podcast that only Republican appointees and a few career employees remain “while we close down the agency.”

“We want to put it out – and we will be successful probably within the next two, three months,” Vought said. 

Trump administration officials have tried repeatedly this year to hobble or shutter the agency but have, at times run into court-ordered roadblocks.

The CFPB spokesperson said the hearing process likely will be a moot point for Levenbach. The Senate probably wouldn’t get around to it until next year, the spokesperson said, and with Vought not going anywhere, the formal process may not occur. 

Michael Emancipator, senior vice president and regulatory counsel at the Independent Community Bankers of America, noted on LinkedIn Wednesday that Levenbach’s nomination appears to be “merely a resetting of the clock” under the Federal Vacancies Reform Act. And McGuireWoods partner Jeff Ehrlich, a former deputy enforcement director at the CFPB, said the nomination is “likely a placeholder,” according to a LinkedIn post. 

The spokesperson pointed to a news release the bureau issued last week, in which the CFPB said it informed the court in NTEU v. Vought that the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel determined that the CFPB can’t legally request funds from the Federal Reserve under the Dodd-Frank Act.

The CFPB “anticipates having sufficient funds to continue operations until at least December 31,” the release said. DOJ attorneys told the court that available funds are expected to run out in early 2026.

Levenbach is also vice chair of the National Capital Planning Commission, a panel that Vought threatened to involve in this summer’s dust-up over an over-budget renovation at the Federal Reserve. 

Levenbach served as chief of staff of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration during Trump’s first term. Later, he became a senior adviser with the White House National Economic Council and the White House Council on Environmental Quality, according to his LinkedIn profile. 

Prior to those roles, he spent about a decade at OMB. 

“Donald Trump’s sending the Senate a new nominee to lead the CFPB looks like nothing more than a front for Russ Vought to stay on as Acting Director indefinitely as he tries to illegally close down the agency,” Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-MA, ranking member of the Senate Banking Committee, said in a Wednesday statement. “Instead of doing everything in their power to lower costs for Americans, Trump and Vought want to make it easier for giant corporations to scam families out of their money.” 

Consumer Bankers Association CEO Lindsey Johnson said Levenbach’s nomination “comes at a critical time for consumers and the financial services marketplace.”

“America’s leading Main Street banks look forward to continuing to work with the Trump Administration on data-driven, pro-growth policies that will support hardworking Americans and drive the economy forward, while at the same time ensuring the Bureau fulfills its statutory mission and sticks to what Congress authorized it to do,” she said in a Wednesday statement. “This will not only help restore the trust and credibility of the CFPB, but will benefit consumers, industry, and the broader economy alike.”