Today CASE issued a statement regarding its support of a free-market coalition it has joined asking Congress to employ the Congressional Review Act (CRA) to overturn a rule from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) that denies millions access to short-term loans and emergency credit.
The rule was implemented by former CFPB director Richard Cordray, appointed by President Obama, and impacts 12 million consumers, denying them access to over $11 billion dollars in available consumer credit. According the CFPB’s own study, the rule will put up to 80 percent of short-term loan vendors out of business. Said CASE:
“This rule imparts immediate financial harm to millions of consumers, including the most financially vulnerable, by denying them the opportunity to access credit and the right to make financial decisions in their own interest. If this rule stands, there will be irreparable harm and lost opportunity to countless Americans, in some cases leading to an increase in defaults, evictions. In many more cases the CFPB will force consumers into the arms of illegal or unsavory lenders who will take severe advantage of their circumstances.”
The coalition letter, further states:
The CFPB’s rule will make it harder for millions of struggling Americans to cover emergency expenses between paychecks. Congress must take action now to protect these vulnerable consumers’ access to credit.
The rule also deprives citizens and lawmakers in every state from deciding for themselves how to regulate small dollar loans and fails to take into consideration the impact the rule will have on small businesses, the letter explains.
“CASE urges Congress not to wait, and through a simple majority pass H. J. Res 122, which will reverse this harmful and destructive denial of credit to millions.”
