White House Taps Warren To Set Up Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
First Posted: 09-15-10 06:05 PM | Updated: 09-15-10 10:17 PM
The White House has tapped Elizabeth Warren as a special adviser to help set up the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, affirming its support for a tough new agency charged with protecting consumers from abusive lenders.
The move allows her to act as an interim head of the CFPB and will enable her to begin setting up the agency immediately and prevent the GOP from filibustering her nomination. Warren could serve until President Barack Obama nominates a permanent director to serve the five-year term -- a nomination he's not required to make for some time. Obama also could nominate her as the permanent director in the near future, a prospect that has been discussed among top aides, according to a person familiar with White House deliberations. Warren formally will be named as a special adviser reporting directly to Obama, and serving in a similar capacity to Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, later this week.
The CFPB was a cornerstone of Obama's financial reform package and Warren is credited as the intellectual founder of the agency -- a proposal she advocated three years ago. The ability of the administration to nominate an acting director to serve while the agency is launched within the Treasury Department was first reported by HuffPost in July.
The appointment, though, was first reported Wednesday by ABC News. A senior Democratic congressional aide with knowledge of the decision confirmed the report to HuffPost.
On Tuesday, Sen. Christopher Dodd (D-Conn.), chairman of the Banking Committee, said that such an appointment could create a backlash and lead the next Congress to defund the bureau. On Friday, a former chief economist for the International Monetary Fund, Simon Johnson, laid out the case for an interim appointment.
As a White House adviser, Warren will have a direct line into the Oval Office. A Bloomberg report on Wednesday speculated that Warren would be named as a counselor to Geithner -- an irony noted by some commentators given their contentious relationship.
The Huffington Post reported July 15 that Geithner had expressed opposition to Warren getting the nod. Geithner, his key lieutenants and top White House officials, while not denying the report, stressed repeatedly that they all felt she was "extremely well qualified." To date, no one has publicly denied the HuffPost report.