PALM BEACH, Fla. — President Donald Trump has fired the director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, Rohit Chopra, in the latest purge of a Biden administration holdover.
Chopra was one of the more important regulators from the previous Democratic administration who was still on the job since Trump took office Jan. 20. His tenure saw the removal of medical debt from credit reports and limits on overdraft penalties, all based on the premise that the financial system could be fairer and more competitive in ways that helped consumers. But many in the financial industry viewed his actions as regulatory overreach.
In a social media post Saturday about his departure, Chopra thanked people across the country who “shared their ideas and experiences” with the government’s consumer financial watchdog agency.
“You helped us hold powerful companies & their executives accountable for breaking the law, and you made our work better,” Chopra posted on X above pictures of his letter announcing that he would no longer lead the bureau.
During Trump’s first term, the Republican had picked Chopra as a Democratic member of the Federal Trade Commission.
In his letter, Chopra noted that the bureau had prepared rules to block Russia, China and others from using data brokers to surveil Americans, and had put forth policies intended to prevent people from losing access to banking services for exercising their constitutional right to express their political or religious views.
The letter noted that the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has also analyzed Trump’s campaign proposal to cap credit card interest rates.
Chopra was notified of his firing in an email, according to a person familiar with the notice who spoke on condition of anonymity.
In many ways, Chopra exemplified some of the tensions between Trump’s promises to curb regulations for businesses and his populist appeals to voters. When The Associated Press reported on Jan. 22 that Chopra remained in his job after Trump took the oath of office, his critics in the financial sector quickly said the president needed to dismiss him.
“The longer Director Chopra stays, the harder it will be for this pro-growth administration to undo the politically-driven, government-price setting agenda that former President Biden’s appointee has engaged in over the last several years at the Bureau,” emailed Weston Loyd, press secretary at the Consumer Bankers Association.
Richard Hunt, executive chairman of the Electronic Payments Coalition, said Chopra’s tenure “was marked by witch-hunts and political weaponization” of the bureau, arguing that Chopra’s policies reduced the access that “vulnerable consumers” had to financial credit.
But many liberal groups stressed that Chopra’s work helped to return billions of dollars to consumers.
