Senate Republicans have supplanted efforts to zero out the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau within their megabill with a proposed funding cut that wouldn’t affect the bureau’s statutory functions.
After Senate parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough ruled last week that the bill’s efforts to cut CFPB funding to zero fell outside the limits of reconciliation, a legislative process that allows the Senate to pass bills with only a simple majority, lawmakers released updated text of their provisions Thursday.
The new plan would cap the CFPB’s access to funding at 6.5% of the Federal Reserve operating budget, decreased from its current limit of 12%. Senate Banking Committee Chairman Tim Scott, R-SC, said the change would save $2 billion.
MacDonough approved the changes, according to Reuters.
“After working closely with my colleagues on the committee and across the Republican conference, as well as the Senate Parliamentarian, we’re in a position to advance legislation that helps deliver on President Trump’s mandate to cut waste and duplication in our federal government and save hardworking taxpayer dollars,” Scott said in a prepared statement.
An earlier House Financial Services Committee version of the bill would have capped the CFPB’s funding at 5% of the Fed’s total operating budget from 2009.
Chris Willis, a partner at the law firm Troutman Pepper Locke, told Banking Dive that “[e]ven though that would be a significant reduction in the CFPB's available budget, that would allow the agency to still employ hundreds of employees.”
“If the bureau concentrated those employees in areas like supervision, enforcement, and regulations, it could still do a tremendous amount of work, even at that funding level,” Willis said.
The CFPB did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
