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Lori Sommerfield

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With over two decades of consumer financial services experience in federal government, in-house, and private practice settings, and a specialty in fair lending regulatory compliance, Lori counsels clients in supervisory issues, examinations, investigations, and enforcement actions.

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On October 1, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB or Bureau) released its Fair Lending Report for 2025, documenting a significant overhaul of the Bureau’s fair lending program under current leadership. The report describes a deliberate pivot away from the enforcement priorities of prior administrations toward what the CFPB characterizes as a narrower, more statutorily-grounded approach focused on proven, intentional discrimination with identifiable victims. The report also notes that, consistent with President Trump’s agenda, the CFPB has prioritized implementation of several executive orders, including directives prohibiting unlawful debanking, terminating discriminatory preferences, and ending the use of disparate impact in enforcing federal fair lending laws.

As we reported in December 2025, New Jersey’s Division on Civil Rights (DCR) adopted what its Attorney General described as the “most comprehensive state-level disparate impact regulations in the country” under the New Jersey Law Against Discrimination (LAD). Those rules, effective December 15, 2025, codify a broad burden-shifting framework for disparate impact claims across housing, lending, employment, public accommodations, and contracting, and include specific guidance on liability arising from the use of artificial intelligence and automated decision-making tools. Now, the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) has filed suit to stop them.

On September 2, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (Federal Reserve), Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), and National Credit Union Administration (NCUA) issued a joint statement clarifying the confidentiality requirements related to Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs), particularly when banks communicate with customers regarding potentially fraudulent transactions, other suspicious activity, or account closures. The statement applies to all banks, including community banks.

On August 25, seven federal agencies — the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB or Bureau), National Credit Union Administration, Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), U.S. Department of Justice, and Federal Housing Finance Agency (the agencies) — jointly rescinded the February 2022 “Interagency Statement on Special Purpose Credit Programs Under the Equal Credit Opportunity Act and Regulation B,” effective immediately upon Federal Register publication. The agencies’ stated reason for the rescission was to clarify that creditors may not discriminate against borrowers based on prohibited characteristics, and that creditors should not rely on the Interagency Statement or related guidance going forward concerning special purpose credit programs (SPCPs). Curiously, the Federal Reserve Board, which joined in issuing the original Interagency Statement, was not a party to the notice of rescission, instead electing to separately withdraw its own version rather than join the other agencies in the joint rescission.

More than two years after filing suit, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and Connecticut Attorney General William Tong have secured a $4 million settlement with Manchester, Connecticut auto dealer Chase Nissan LLC, doing business as Manchester City Nissan, along with its owners and managers, resolving allegations of widespread deceptive fee practices targeting consumers in the car-buying process.

This article was republished on insideARM on August 25, 2026.

On August 14, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB or Bureau) announced that it is ceasing the discretionary publication of unverified consumer complaint narratives and related data visualizations in its Consumer Complaint Database. The move represents a significant change to one of the Bureau’s most publicly visible data tools that will meaningfully reduce reputational risk for financial institutions and financial services companies.

On August 7, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) issued a policy statement announcing that it will no longer pursue claims based on disparate impact or “unfair discrimination” theories under any statute it enforces. The FTC’s action is the latest in a series of coordinated federal agency moves away from disparate impact enforcement. As we previously reported here, the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) proposed to repeal its Fair Housing Act disparate impact regulations in January 2026, and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) finalized its rewrite of Subpart A of Regulation B under the Equal Credit Opportunity Act (ECOA) in April 2026, eliminating the disparate impact “effects test” from ECOA enforcement and reframing ECOA as an intent-only statute (see here). Together with the FTC’s action, these developments signal a sweeping realignment of federal fair lending and consumer protection enforcement away from outcome-based theories and toward intentional discrimination as the operative standard.

On July 31, the OCC and FDIC jointly issued a proposed rule to significantly amend their existing Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) regulations that have been in place since 1995.  While the proposal would retain key elements of the regulatory framework, it seeks to better align the regulations with CRA’s statutory mandate of encouraging banks to meet the credit needs of their communities by making “targeted” substantive, technical, and process-oriented changes and narrowing the scope of the rules.  Toward that end, the proposal focuses on the lending test, ensures that community development grants reach the communities they are intended to benefit, and narrows the range of retail banking services the agencies consider for CRA credit by excluding deposit services.  The proposed rule also seeks to provide greater clarity on how a bank receives CRA consideration and to reduce burden on banks (particularly community banks). Notably, the Federal Reserve Board (FRB) did not join the proposal.

Yesterday, the federal banking regulators issued new interagency guidance directing supervised financial institutions to take a closer look at credit risk when lending to individuals who are not legally authorized to work in the U.S. The guidance, issued jointly by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), and National Credit Union Administration (NCUA), follows a May 2026 Executive Order (discussed here) aimed at addressing perceived risks to the financial system arising from the extension of credit to the non-work authorized population.

On July 6, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB or Bureau) released its 2026 regulatory agenda, outlining its planned rulemaking initiatives across the pre-rule, proposed rule, and final rule stages. The agenda reflects the Bureau’s continued shift under the current administration toward deregulation, regulatory streamlining, and reconsideration of rules issued under prior leadership.