Since its founding, the CFPB has used technology tools to monitor how financial entities used social media and algorithms to target consumers.

The CFPB's creation was authorized by the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, whose passage in 2010 was a legislative response to the financial crisis of 2007–08 and the subsequent Great Recession[3] and is an independent bureau within the Federal Reserve.

In June 2020, the United States Supreme Court ruled that the president can remove the director without cause but allowed the agency to remain in operation.

[5] Donald Trump, at the outset of his second presidential term, appointed an acting director who immediately ordered the Bureau to stop regulatory activity.

According to the United States Treasury Department, the bureau is tasked with the responsibility to "promote fairness and transparency for mortgages, credit cards, and other consumer financial products and services".

[10] In 2016 alone most of the hundreds and thousands of consumer complaints about their financial services—including banks and credit card issuers—were received and compiled by CFPB and are publicly available on a federal government database.

[17][18] Due to the way the legislation creating the bureau was written, until the first director was in place, the agency was not able to write new rules or supervise financial institutions other than banks.

[22] However, Cordray's nomination was immediately in jeopardy due to 44 Senate Republicans vowing to derail any nominee in order to encourage a decentralized structure of the organization.

This was a highly controversial move as the Senate was still holding pro forma sessions, and the possibility existed that the appointment could be challenged in court.

Bill Himpler, executive vice president of the American Financial Services Association, a trade group representing banks and other lenders responded "Something needs to be done."

[32] On February 13, 2021, President Joe Biden formally submitted to the Senate the nomination of Rohit Chopra to serve as director of the CFPB.

[34] In December 2021, CFPB fined LendUp $100,000 due to deceptive marketing and fair lending violations, and the company was required to stop issuing new loans.

[6][42] In February 2025, the Bureau became a target of the Department of Government Efficiency, the Elon Musk-led team carrying out part of Trump's cost-cutting agenda.

[45] Helaine Olen, from the American Economic Liberties Project, argues that closing down the CFPB "is an overt power grab by Big Tech — and their gain could result in the rest of us losing much more than almost anyone realizes.

[47] On February 14, 2025, a judge of the Federal District Court in Washington ordered officials at the CFPB not to “delete, destroy, remove or impair any data” or fire employees en masse.

[50] Claims may be filed by individual customers and address a variety of unfair business practices by companies, such as refusals to remove errant fees, or to provide compensation for damages.

Because of legal constraints, the agency used a system to "guess" the race of auto loan applicants based on their last name and listed address.

Based on that information, the agency charged several lenders were discriminating against minority applicants and levied large fines and settlements against those companies.

[61] Cordray was accused but cleared of any violations of the Hatch Act as Director of the CFPB after being investigated by the Office of Special Counsel (OSC).[62][relevant?]

[63] On May 24, 2018, Trump signed into law the Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief and Consumer Protection Act, exempting dozens of banks from the CFPB's regulations.

Unbridled from constitutionally-required accountability, CFPB has engaged in ultra vires and abusive practices, including attempts to regulate the practice of law (a function reserved for state bars), attempts to collect attorney-client protected material, and overreaching demands for, and mining of, personal financial information of American citizens, which has prompted a Government Accountability Office ("GAO") investigation, commenced on July 12, 2013.

[77] In October 2016, the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled that it was unconstitutional for the CFPB director to be removable by the president of the United States only for cause, such as "inefficiency, neglect of duty or malfeasance.

[78] Circuit Judge Karen L. Henderson agreed that the CFPB Director had been wrong in adopting a new interpretation of the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act, finding the statute of limitations did not apply to the CFPB, and fining the petitioning mortgage company PHH Corporation $109 million, but she dissented from giving the president a new power to remove the director, citing constitutional avoidance.

[86] On June 29, 2020, the Supreme Court ruled in a 5–4 decision that the firing protections of the director are an unconstitutional restraint on the president's ability to oversee executive branch agencies.

"Such an agency lacks a foundation in historical practice and clashes with constitutional structure by concentrating power in a unilateral actor insulated from Presidential control," Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in the majority opinion, which was joined by his conservative colleagues.

[92] On November 25, the Office of Legal Counsel released an opinion, written by Assistant Attorney General Steven Engel, asserting that the President has the authority under the FVRA to designate an acting CFPB Director.

[98][99] On November 28, 2017, U.S. District Judge Timothy J. Kelly, who had been appointed by President Trump just a few months earlier, denied English's motion for a preliminary injunction and allowed Mulvaney to begin serving as CFPB acting director.

The 5–4 decision ruled that the CFPB structure, with a sole director that could only be terminated for cause, was unconstitutional as it violated the separation of powers, vacating the lower court judgement and remanding the case for review.

Roberts wrote that the CFPB structure with a single point of leadership that could only be removed for cause "has no foothold in history or tradition", and has only been used in four other instances: three current uses for the United States Office of Special Counsel, the Social Security Administration, and the Federal Housing Finance Agency, and temporarily for one year during the American Civil War for the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency.

Kagan wrote that "Today's decision wipes out a feature of that agency its creators thought fundamental to its mission—a measure of independence from political pressure.