Sawt Falasteen - Trump team orders work pause at US consumer protection agency

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) was set up in the wake of the 2008 global financial crisis and is tasked with protecting American consumers from corporate misconduct.

It serves as a watchdog over a variety of consumer issues ranging from mortgages to credit cards to debt collection, and has long been a target of Republican lawmakers and industry.

In the message to staff, acting CFPB director Russell Vought said the agency's Washington office would be closed this week, and told employees not to show up.

"Please do not perform any work tasks," said Vought, Trump's new director of the White House Office of Management and Budget, and a key architect of the conservative plan known as Project 2025 to reform the federal government.

Vought added that staff would need to seek written permission from him before doing any urgent work going forward, and should otherwise "stand down from performing any work task."

Republicans have long accused the independent agency of overreach, with some of Trump's most ardent supporters -- including the tech billionaire Elon Musk -- calling for its closure.

The union representing CFPB employees filed two lawsuits against Vought on Sunday, accusing him of trying to shut down the agency -- which was created by Congress -- and of giving the Musk-led Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) access to employees' personal information.

Vought's actions reflected "an unlawful attempt to thwart Congress's decision to create the CFPB to protect American consumers," the National Treasury Employees Union argued in one of the lawsuits.

-'Weaponization ends right now' -

The CFPB "has long functioned as another woke, weaponized arm of the bureaucracy that leverages its power against certain industries and individuals disfavored by so-called 'elites,'" the White House said in a statement published Monday.

"Under the administration of President Donald J. Trump, the weaponization ends right now," it added.

The decision to pause all work at CFPB and close down its offices appears to be an attempt to curtail its oversight powers without shuttering it entirely -- something that would require congressional approval.

"Congress built the CFPB, and no one other than Congress -- not the president, not Musk, not Vought -- can shut it down," Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren, who helped create the agency, said in a video message.

In a separate statement, Democrats including Warren announced plans for a protest outside the CFPB's Washington offices for Monday, to "sound the alarm" against Musk and Vought's "attempt to kill" the agency.

B.Khalifa--SF-PST