Editor’s Note: Brendan Peterson from PunchBowl News broke the story on this reintroduction.
Washington, D.C.—U.S. Congressman Andy Barr (R-KY), Chairman of the House Financial Services Subcommittee on Financial Institutions and Monetary Policy, reintroduced the Taking Account of Bureaucrats’ Spending (TABS) Act. The TABS Act would subject the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) to the traditional congressional appropriations process, like virtually every other federal agency. Currently, the CFPB bypasses the appropriations process by receiving its funding directly from the Federal Reserve. Furthermore, the TABS Act would make the CFPB an independent agency named the Consumer Financial Empowerment Agency.
“The CFPB is the most unaccountable and authoritarian agency in the entire federal bureaucracy. I’m leading this legislation to give the CFPB the wholesale makeover it needs to finally be accountable to Congress,” said Congressman Barr. “The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals and prominent legal scholars have been clear that the CFPB’s novel and unique funding structure is unconstitutional by violating the Appropriations Clause. The TABS Act corrects this by requiring the Bureau to go through the traditional federal appropriations The special treatment the CFPB has been receiving that has allowed for reckless spending and regulatory overreach will come to an end with the passage of the TABS Act. This allows Congress to use its most powerful tool - the power of the purse - to ensure this CFPB is actually about consumer empowerment and not another vehicle for left-wing bureaucrats to advance the power of the administrative state.”