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Stefanie Jackman

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Stefanie takes a holistic approach to working with clients both through compliance counseling and assessment relating to consumer products and services, as well as serving as a zealous advocate in government inquiries, investigations, and consumer litigation.

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Three nonprofit organizations have filed a complaint in the Northern District of California seeking declaratory and injunctive relief to prevent what they describe as a de facto shutdown of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB or Bureau). Their suit targets Acting Director Russell Vought’s refusal to request funding for the Bureau from the Federal Reserve Board (Fed), arguing that Congress designed a statutory provision that provides stable, standing appropriation to support the CFPB’s mission and that the Director’s recent interpretation of the statute — which is being used to support the refusal to request funding — unlawfully cuts off those funds. The plaintiffs ask the court to compel the CFPB to fulfill its statutory duty by requesting funding immediately.

As reported by Bloomberg, the Democratic Attorneys General Association (DAGA) has hired Rohit Chopra, former Director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB or Bureau), to lead a new Consumer Protection and Affordability Working Group within DAGA’s policy arm. The move was announced as a coordinated, state-led response to rising living costs and widespread fraud, with a policy agenda that spans financial services, technology, and health care.

On November 24, the plaintiffs in National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) v. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB or Bureau) filed a motion to clarify the existing injunction, asking the court to confirm that the CFPB may not justify noncompliance by declining to request funds from the Federal Reserve Board (Fed) and that “combined earnings” under 12 U.S.C. § 5497(a)(1) refers to the Federal Reserve System’s total earnings, not a net figure reduced by interest expense. In response, Judge Amy Berman Jackson issued a minute order directing the parties to file submissions by November 26 identifying which provisions of the preliminary injunction they believe remain in force and addressing the court’s authority to enforce those provisions in light of the D.C. Circuit’s August 15 opinion and the pending petition for rehearing en banc.

On November 21, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB or Bureau) notified staff that it will restart supervision and require examiners, beginning with the 2026 examination cycle, to open each review by reading to the supervised entity a Humility in Supervisions Pledge. The pledge signals a notable shift in tone and execution that is in line with the CFPB’s Memorandum on Supervision and Enforcement Priorities from April 2025. Specifically, examinations will now have tighter alignment to the CFPB’s statutory authority, narrower and more clearly scoped exams (with a focus on “identified priority markets”), greater transparency and predictability, and an express preference to remediate issues in Supervision rather than escalate to Enforcement. It also formalizes a renewed focus on tangible consumer harm, especially to service members, their families, and veterans, and aims to minimize duplicative oversight where states or other regulators are already active.

As reported by Law360 on November 20, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB or Bureau) will hand off its remaining enforcement lawsuits and other active litigation to the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) as the Bureau prepares for a potential funding lapse. CFPB staff were informed that DOJ will begin assuming matters from the CFPB’s enforcement and legal divisions in the coming weeks, with transfer logistics to be worked out. It remains unclear whether all pending cases will survive the transition or whether case schedules and continuity will be affected.

Yesterday, President Trump nominated Stuart Levenbach, an energy official at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), to serve a five-year term as permanent director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB or Bureau). Levenbach’s experience is in natural resources and energy policy rather than financial regulation, and he would inherit an agency facing profound uncertainty after months of leadership turmoil, enforcement retrenchment, and dwindling finances.

In this episode of FCRA Focus, co-hosts Dave Gettings and Kim Phan are joined by partner Stefanie Jackman to unpack the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB) evolving interpretation of Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) preemption. They trace the timeline from the CFPB’s July 2022 interpretive rule, through its withdrawal in May 2025, to the October 2025 confirmation and new guidance embracing a broader view of preemption under 15 U.S.C. § 1681t(b)(1). The team discusses how the CFPB’s latest stance could impact state laws regulating consumer reports beyond “credit” — including medical debt, rental information, and criminal background checks — and why interpretive rules, despite being helpful and persuasive, are not binding on courts. They also explore practical implications for litigation and compliance, the current judicial environment for agency deference, and the ongoing tension between the need for nationwide uniformity and the growing patchwork of state-by-state mini-FCRA laws.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB or Bureau) has proposed an unprecedented, far‑reaching rewrite of Regulation B (Reg B) under the Equal Credit Opportunity Act (ECOA). If finalized, the proposed rule would eliminate disparate‑impact liability under ECOA, significantly narrow the scope of “discouragement” to focus on explicit statements directed at applicants or prospective applicants, and prohibit or tightly restrict the use of certain protected‑class criteria in Special Purpose Credit Programs (SPCPs) offered by for‑profit organizations. Existing SPCP‑originated credit would be grandfathered.

Comments are due 30 days after publication in the Federal Register, with a proposed effective date 90 days after publication.

Yesterday, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) notified the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia and the D.C. Circuit in the matter of National Treasury Employees Union v. Vought that the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB or Bureau) anticipates exhausting its currently available funds in early 2026. The filing attaches a November 7 opinion from the Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) to Acting Director Vought concluding that the CFPB’s statutory funding stream — quarterly transfers from the “combined earnings of the Federal Reserve System” under 12 U.S.C. § 5497(a)(1) — is unavailable while the Federal Reserve operates at a loss. The Bureau expects to continue operating, including in compliance with an existing district court injunction, through at least December 31, 2025, but absent congressional action may face a funding lapse thereafter, which would trigger Antideficiency Act constraints.

On October 29, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB or Bureau) officially rescinded its rule requiring nonbank entities to register certain agency and court orders with the Bureau. This decision follows a proposal made earlier this year (discussed here), which highlighted concerns about the regulatory burden and costs imposed on nonbank entities, which could ultimately affect consumers.