Democratic Senator and former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren issued a “code red” warning to the American people about tech billionaire turned Trump jockey and head of the unelected and wildly unchecked Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) Elon Musk — with a specific focus on the recent decision to freeze the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) by Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought — a move that she’s describing as a blatant attempt to destroy consumer protections in the US.
NBC News recently obtained an internal email that showed Vaught, the newly installed acting head of the CFPB, ordering employees to halt supervision, investigations, enforcement actions, and stakeholder engagement. Vaught further announced that the bureau would not be pulling its next round of funding from the Federal Reserve, calling their $711.6 million balance “excessive.”
Vaught’s recent actions are only a small part of a much larger effort by Trump and his administration to cut costs and parse down federal agencies — all of which is, of course, being spearheaded by Twitter owner Elon Musk, whose DOGE entity is brutally targeting regulatory bodies like the CFPB and USAID.
Musk personally took to his social media platform with a post that declared “CFPB RIP,” alongside a tombstone emoji.
Just shortly after that unsettling post went up, the CFPB X account and website went down.
Today, Elizabeth Warren took to X with a fiery video, in which she sharply criticized the move and warned the American people about what Elon Musk is doing:
If you have a bank account or credit card or mortgage or student loan, this is code red! I am ringing the alarm bell. Elon Musk and the guy who wrote Project 2025, Russ Vought, are trying to kill the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. If they succeed, CEOs and Wall Street will once again be free to trick, trap, and cheat you.
The CFPB is the little agency working to shut down scams and fraud on payment apps like Zelle and PayPal and Cash App. It’s the agency that steps in when the big bank trips up and repossesses your car. It’s the agency that’s working to cut those crazy fees that banks and credit card companies bury down in the fine print and then you gotta pay for them. Already, this little agency has forced giant banks and corporations to give back more than $21 billion directly to families they cheated – and that includes hundreds of millions of dollars back for veterans who got cheated by predatory lenders.
So why are these two guys trying to gut the CFPB? Not rocket science. Trump campaigned on helping working people. But now that he’s in charge, this is the payoff to the rich guys who invested in his campaign and who want to cheat families and not have anybody around to stop them.
It’s another scam.
After the 2008 financial crash and the big bank bailout, Congress created the CFPB to protect people from getting swindled. For years, Republicans have tried and tried again to repeal it in Congress, and they have failed every single time. Congress built the CFPB, and no one other than Congress, not the president, not Musk, not Vought, can shut it down.
There is power in fighting back. Power. We will not let up in Congress or the courts until we win this fight. So please, call your representative and most of all, get the word out. We are here to fight for the little agency that fights for us.”
Watch Warren’s powerful video message here:
President Trump campaigned on lowering costs. But he’s letting billionaire Elon Musk and Project 2025 Architect Russ Vought kill the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
If they succeed, CEOs on Wall Street will once again be free to cheat you out of your savings. pic.twitter.com/XzLXyz7hDn
— Elizabeth Warren (@SenWarren) February 10, 2025
Featured image via The Resistance Report Gallery