For much of its life, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau did what its name implies - it tried to help consumers who had been mistreated by businesses. It filed nearly 400 lawsuits and other enforcement actions against banks and other financial firms between 2012 and early 2025, when President Trump’s second term began.
Trump’s team lost no time shutting down what had been an aggressive pro-consumer operation, firing the CFPB’s director, canceling its office lease and laying off or firing most of its staff. The Trump forces shut down pending lawsuits against many companies and even refunded the money that some had paid as penalties.
The Guardian decided to take a look at what consumers are complaining about and the results, while not surprising, are quite revealing. It found that complaints about the firms that had been the targets of enforcement actions prior to the Trump takeover were still producing a large volume of complaints. In August, the bureau said it would stop publishing complaints until companies had a chance to respond.
In fact, the newspaper’s investigation found that those companies — JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America and Berkshire Hathaway — were producing more complaints than ever.
Consumer complaints about companies named in now-dropped suits against 17 financial firms shot up by more than 75%.
Complaints against Rocket Mortgage, for example, increased more than 130% after the CFPB dropped a lawsuit against a subsidiary accused of using kickbacks to home buyers to Rocket.
Despite the bureau’s lack of action on Trump-era complaints, consumers continue to demand action. Publicly posted complaints have grown from about 2.7 million in 2024 to 6.3 million this year.
“People are getting screwed twice: first by the company, second by the agency that’s supposed to stick up for them,” said Erie Meyer, a former technologist at CFPB, quoted by the Guardian. “Consumers are telling the bureau that there is an emergency, and the bureau is not listening or acting on that information.”
A turnaround in the works?
There may be some relief in the works. Last week’s Democratic primary blowout may bring new support for the CFPB from Congress but it will be difficult to get around Trump’s veto power and executive orders.
Perhaps more encouraging in the short term is increased activity by private-sector lawyers and state attorney generals who have been trying to fill the vacuum left by the CFPB.
“Nature abhors a vacuum,” attorneys at Ballard Spahr wrote in a recent analysis of the changing enforcement landscape.