The corrupt and power-hungry Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
Link here. The CFPB was established under the Dodd-Frank law signed by Obama under a framework that one court has already ruled is unconstitutional.
[A]s is common in Washington, the vague language used to craft that law gave regulators wide latitude and the bureau emerged in the Obama administration as a powerful force in the regulatory state.
“There’s strong evidence that the CFPB was pursuing Obama administration tactics and priorities, even if it was not directly coordinating with other Obama-run agencies,” said John Berlau, a scholar with the conservative Competitive Enterprise Institute. As an example of such connections, Berlau pointed to Operation Choke Point, a 2013 Justice Department initiative during which the CFPB pursued payday lenders while prosecutors focused on banks dealing with those businesses or gun retailers. “Like other Obama regulators, the CFPB attempted to make law through administrative maneuvers,” Berlau told RCI. “Yet the CFPB’s abuses of process exceeded even those of other Obama administration bureaucracies due to the bureau’s unique lack of accountability.”
That lack of accountability was one of the reasons a three-judge panel on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled the CFPB an unconstitutional entity in October 2016 – a decision that awaits an en banc ruling from the Appeals Court.
The article outlines how the CFPB has used its vague regulatory powers during the Obama administration to begin open investigations into numerous businesses, not based on any suspected crimes but as a weapon of the Obama administration against businesses it did not like.
The bad part of this story is that there appears no effort by the Trump administration to shut down this out-of-control agency. Instead, it is trying to “rein” it in. Meanwhile, this agency, which according to the law that created it, can spend money without Congressional approval, and is doing so at rates that would make billionaires like Trump blush: A New CFPB Scandal – Cost Overruns for Its New Lux Headquarters
Original cost estimates for the CFPB’s renovation were estimated at $55 million, but the bureau ran up the proposed cost to $216 million. The Federal Reserve Inspector General rejected the proposal in 2014, saying there was no “sound basis” for the figure.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Link here. The CFPB was established under the Dodd-Frank law signed by Obama under a framework that one court has already ruled is unconstitutional.
[A]s is common in Washington, the vague language used to craft that law gave regulators wide latitude and the bureau emerged in the Obama administration as a powerful force in the regulatory state.
“There’s strong evidence that the CFPB was pursuing Obama administration tactics and priorities, even if it was not directly coordinating with other Obama-run agencies,” said John Berlau, a scholar with the conservative Competitive Enterprise Institute. As an example of such connections, Berlau pointed to Operation Choke Point, a 2013 Justice Department initiative during which the CFPB pursued payday lenders while prosecutors focused on banks dealing with those businesses or gun retailers. “Like other Obama regulators, the CFPB attempted to make law through administrative maneuvers,” Berlau told RCI. “Yet the CFPB’s abuses of process exceeded even those of other Obama administration bureaucracies due to the bureau’s unique lack of accountability.”
That lack of accountability was one of the reasons a three-judge panel on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled the CFPB an unconstitutional entity in October 2016 – a decision that awaits an en banc ruling from the Appeals Court.
The article outlines how the CFPB has used its vague regulatory powers during the Obama administration to begin open investigations into numerous businesses, not based on any suspected crimes but as a weapon of the Obama administration against businesses it did not like.
The bad part of this story is that there appears no effort by the Trump administration to shut down this out-of-control agency. Instead, it is trying to “rein” it in. Meanwhile, this agency, which according to the law that created it, can spend money without Congressional approval, and is doing so at rates that would make billionaires like Trump blush: A New CFPB Scandal – Cost Overruns for Its New Lux Headquarters
Original cost estimates for the CFPB’s renovation were estimated at $55 million, but the bureau ran up the proposed cost to $216 million. The Federal Reserve Inspector General rejected the proposal in 2014, saying there was no “sound basis” for the figure.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
The way the establishing language was written, it made the CFPB ‘self funding’ with specific earmarked-taxes (and fee’s/penalties on Financial entities) and is not subject to Congressional oversight or control, nor Judicial review.
It exists independently of all 3 branches, unless & until everyone is fired, escorted to the parking-lot, and the doors padlocked behind them.
Mitch and Ryan, both love this stuff, for them it’s better than the Import-Export bank. (which will, rise from the dead.)
I think it was established by Dodd-Frank.
NormD: You are correct. My mistake. I have fixed the post.
“There’s strong evidence that the CFPB was pursuing Obama administration tactics and priorities, even if it was not directly coordinating with other Obama-run agencies,” said John Berlau
But I bet you would find there was coordination. Too bad the Democracy Dies in Darkness crowd is incapable of looking into actual abuses of power.
I don’t care how it was established. If it can be allowed to spend money without Congressional approval then congress is part of a criminal conspiracy. It’s RICO time! We live in a day of such corruption I can’t believe.
Hi All,
So what would be the committees where Congress would begin to address this extra-Constituional government entity. Banking?
If we know that, then these would be the Congress people to target with emails and calls asking what they are going to do about this.
Kan Anthony wrote,
“I don’t care how it was established. If it can be allowed to spend money without Congressional approval then congress is part of a criminal conspiracy. It’s RICO time! We live in a day of such corruption I can’t believe.”
One of my biggest problems with Obamacare is the hundreds of pages that said simply “the Secretary of HHS shall determine. . .” The bill was one long series of surrendering power to the executive branch, and should have been defeated on that grounds alone.
Mr. Z–when you refer to:
“one court has already ruled is unconstitutional.”
–Are you referring to the case “PHH vs. CFPB?” (Ted Olson was the litigator for PHH corp.) I never knew what became of that– the District Court had ordered re-arguments in the case last time I had heard.
This CFPB has been in operation since 2012, and I totally forgot about the way in which it’s funded (in part) —by the Federal Reserve.
https://www.cato.org/publications/legal-briefs/phh-v-consumer-financial-protection-bureau
“Its sole director reports to no one but himself, and, under the terms of Dodd-Frank, can be removed by the President only for cause. And it receives its funding not through Congress, but through the Federal Reserve. Not even the Fed has the authority to challenge its spending, however.
Instead, the law says the Fed “shall” give the CFPB the funds it requests, up to 12 percent of the Fed’s total operating expenses. As of 2015, that meant the CFPB could demand up to $443 million in one year.”
Chris– there is no oversight– they have their own totally protected funding source. They are not accountable to anyone, and it’s “illegal” for Trump to fire the Director.
I’ll say it again– Mitch & Ryan love this stuff, and they loved Barney (gay prostitute ring) Frank and Chris Dodd, and it will never, go away.
Ken– oh yeah–that’s exactly what I’d call it– “criminal conspiracy to violate the Constitution.”
They passed it, it’s illegal on it’s face, they don’t CARE, and they will continue to do exactly what they’ve always done, until they are physically stopped.
wodun– oh yeah– there was absolute coordination across the entire obama administration, for 8 years. And they weren’t amateurs. It’s going to take at least a decade to ferret these people out.
Forget the “missing emails on the server in the guest house,”– the ONE place that has ALL the emails for the Obama administration, is Google.
Everyone conducted government business, with their GMail accounts, specifically to evade the recording-keeping laws. It wasn’t just HRC, it was everyone.
Convention of States news clip
may 2017, FOX
https://youtu.be/jTyA3kQPukU
3:24