The Mertens spouses post about this case.
September 28, 2023 ~
Next Tuesday, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in a case that could have far reaching effects on the legislative ability of Congress to have flexibility in how it funds regulatory agencies, as well as place in jeopardy the survival of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), a government watchdog for the little guy, elderly, young, poor and unsophisticated against goliaths on Wall Street and other financial predators.
The case arrives at the Supreme Court as a result of a decision handed down in October by a three-judge panel at the right-wing 5th Circuit Court of Appeals. All three judges on the panel (Don Willett, Kurt Engelhardt, and Cory Wilson) were appointed by former President Donald Trump. The 5th Circuit effectively ruled that the CFPB’s funding system, legislated by Congress, was unconstitutional.
The shadow of Trump and the invisible hand that had an outsized role in setting the agenda for his administration, fossil fuels billionaire Charles Koch, and his corporate law firm – Jones Day – have their footprints all over this case. On Trump’s first day in office, January 20, 2017, Jones Day announced that 12 of its law partners were moving into the Trump administration. Among the 12 was Noel Francisco, who became Trump’s Solicitor General. Francisco is now one of the five Jones Day lawyers representing the opposing side at the Supreme Court attempting to gut funding for the CFPB.
Gutting the funding and power of federal regulatory agencies is something that Charles Koch and his myriad front groups have been attempting to do for the past 40 years.
Right wing Republicans and corporate interests have been attempting to kill the CFPB since it was created under the Dodd-Frank financial reform legislation of 2010, following the financial crash of 2008. Dodd-Frank and the creation of the CFPB came in response to the greatest fraudulent wealth transfer from the middle class to the 1 percent since the Wall Street frauds of the late 1920s. Both periods devastated the U.S. economy for years and left millions of Americans unemployed.
Mega banks on Wall Street and other bad actors are particularly hostile to the fact that the CFPB allows consumers who have been victimized by financial firms, even where small amounts of money are involved, to file a complaint with the CFPB, who then demands a timely written explanation from the alleged wrongdoer. Bad actors dislike the fact that these complaints go into a permanent database at the CFPB, which can be mined by the public, reporters, class-action attorneys and prosecutors looking for patterns of fraud.
On May 15, Senator Sherrod Brown (D-OH), Chairman of the Senate Banking Committee and Congresswoman Maxine Waters (D-CA), Ranking Member of the House Financial Services Committee, led 144 current and former members of Congress in filing an amicus brief in the case: Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) v. Community Financial Services Association of America (CFSA). Their amicus brief argues that when Congress established the CFPB after the 2008 financial crisis, a judgment was made that the CFPB, like other financial regulators, needed independence from unpredictable annual funding cycles to be effective. As legislated in the Dodd-Frank Act, the CFPB is funded through the Federal Reserve. Congress maintains oversight authority of the CFPB, and the Director of the agency testifies regularly before Congress.
The CFSA, the opposing front group, which cleverly put the homespun word “Community” in its name, is the evil twin sister of the CFPB. It’s a pool of financial sharks, including payday lenders, who don’t want a well-funded federal investigatory agency looking into their predatory practices against financially-strapped and/or financially unsophisticated Americans.
[...] The hatred of the CFPB is so strong by predatory financial actors that another front group, American Action Network, launched a $500,000 ad campaign during the November 10, 2015 Republican presidential debate, comparing the advocate for the little guy to a communist organization. The ad features giant banners of then CFPB Director, Richard Cordray, and Senator Elizabeth Warren, who pushed for the creation of the agency, hanging on the front wall in a nod to Soviet dictators.The advertisement was a masterpiece of misinformation, overtly suggesting that the job of the CFPB is to deny car loans and mortgages to regular folks seeking credit. [...]
According to the New York Times, American Action Network, the front group that funded the ad, had admitted that keeping private justice systems alive for corporations, known as mandatory or forced arbitration, was one reason behind the $500,000 outlay for the ad. [...]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Action_Network :
The American Action Network (AAN) is a nonprofit, conservative[4][5] issue advocacy group based in Washington, D.C.,[6] aligned to the Republican Party.[7][8] It was established in 2010 by Fred Malek and Norm Coleman as a 501(c)(4) organization.
The AAN's sister organization, the American Action Forum, is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization focusing on policy research. The American Action Forum is run by former Congressional Budget Office director Doug Holtz-Eakin.[7] AAN officials also run the Congressional Leadership Fund, a super PAC (independent expenditure PAC) focused on electing a House Republican majority.
History and organization
The American Action Network is an advocacy group, incorporated on July 23, 2009,[1] and founded by Fred Malek, founder of Thayer Capital and former Republican National Committee deputy chairman. The organization says that it was founded to promote and support center right issues, conceived in part to counterbalance the liberal Center for American Progress.[9][10] The organization calls itself an "action tank" or a "think-and-do-tank" and is classified as a 501(c)(4).[10][11]
Former Minnesota senator Norm Coleman was hired in 2010 as its chief executive officer.[12] He now serves as chairman of the board of directors[9][10] and also serves on the board of directors of the American Action Forum, a sister organization.[13] In 2011, Brian Walsh, a former political director at the National Republican Congressional Committee, was hired as the group's president, replacing Rob Collins, the former chief of staff to Eric Cantor.[14][15
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| Coleman and his mentor |
I read "Norm Coleman" and the image that comes to mind is an oil slick. Eric Cantor named, the image is an oil slick from a nasty oil spill. People on the other side is one thing, people there, and as well on the Dark Side of the Force, is more to face. Senator Norm, because Paul Wellstone died. Enough.