Rohit Chopra Nominated to lead U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
President-elect Joe Biden today nominated Rohit Chopra to be the Director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). He will assume the post if confirmed by the Senate.
Chopra, 38 years old, is a Commissioner on the Federal Trade Commission. In 2018, he was unanimously confirmed to the post by the Senate. In this role, together with state and international law enforcement partners, he has worked to increase scrutiny of dominant technology firms that pose risks to privacy, national security, and fair competition. He has pushed for remedies against lawbreaking companies, especially repeat offenders.
Chopra previously served as Assistant Director of the CFPB, where he led the agency’s efforts on student loans. In 2011, the administration of President Barack Obama appointed him to serve as the CFPB’s Student Loan Ombudsman, a government overseer of student loans. He also served as a Special Advisor at the U.S. Department of Education.
In these roles, Chopra led efforts to spur competition in the student loan financing market, develop new tools for students and student loan borrowers to make smarter decisions, and secure hundreds of millions of dollars in refunds for borrowers victimized by unlawful conduct by loan servicers, debt collectors, and for-profit college chains.
Following the 2008 financial crisis, President Obama asked Senator Elizabeth Warrent to set up the CFPB, with the goal of protecting consumers from high fees and interest costs and other predatory terms of some financial firms. Warren chose Chopra as the bureau’s assistant director.
Since 2016, lobbyists for the financial firms have gotten President Trump’s administration to dilute the powers of the CFPB. The role of the bureau will be one area of bitter battles between the Democrats and Republicans in the new Congress, which meets this week.
If confirmed by the Senate, Chopra will be tasked with strengthening the bureau’s consumer protection abilities, including from pay day lenders. These lenders are known to charge interest rates in excess of 30% a year to those borrowing against their weekly salary payments, many of whom work for the U.S. defense forces.
Chopra holds a bachelor’s degree from Harvard University and an MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.
