Richmond, Va.—“The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) was created to stop payday, car title, and other high interest, debt trap lenders from abusing working people,” said Ladelle McWhorter, chairperson of Virginia Organizing. “Now the House of Representatives may decide to protect loan sharks instead with the so-called Choice Act (H.R. 10), which would strip the CFPB of the ability to protect consumers. The CFPB would actually be barred from enforcing existing laws or creating new rules to give consumers more protection.”

“We need a watchdog with teeth. Since it was created after the crash of 2008, the CFPB has returned $11.8 billion from financial companies that broke the law to 29 million consumers. The CFPB has been stopping these predatory companies from scams such as telling consumers to pay debts to payday lenders that they did not legally owe. Military service members were illegally overcharged by payday lenders. Payday borrowers were lured into one unaffordable loan after the next. Borrowers were illegally pushed into more expensive car title loans than they needed. The list of rule violations is long, but the CFPB went after all of these dishonest, predatory practices. That’s why we’re joining with other consumer protection groups across the country in calling this bill the Wrong Choice Act and urging all our supporters to call their members of Congress to tell them to vote against it,” McWhorter said.

Virginia Organizing is a non-partisan statewide grassroots organization that brings people together to create a more just Virginia.

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