U.S. Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Democrats press CFPB over deletion of 15 years of website content

Democratic members of the U.S. Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs, led by Ranking Member Elizabeth Warren, wrote to acting Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Director Russell Vought seeking more information on the removal of nearly 15 years of material from the CFPB website and asking what steps will be taken to restore access. The letter says the deleted material includes all press releases, testimony and speeches published before President Donald Trump’s second term, along with consumer advisories, settlement notices, original research and major reports. The senators argued that the removals cut off consumer access to information intended to help people avoid unfair, deceptive and abusive practices and also erased records of corporate misconduct that supported past CFPB enforcement actions. Examples cited include a medical debt collection rights article, information on predatory lending practices, all 35 Supervisory Highlights reports dating back to 2012, material for regulators reviewing bank mergers, guidance on protecting children from identity theft, information on the CFPB’s largest victims relief fund distribution tied to credit repair enforcement actions, and non-English translations of website pages. The letter also linked the website deletions to the CFPB’s dismissal or termination of at least 42 public enforcement actions against Wall Street banks, large technology firms and other companies. The senators asked Vought to provide answers by July 2 so they can assess the impact of the mass deletion of CFPB data.