By Douglas Gillison and Chris Prentice
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau fired some probationary staff on Tuesday, according to a recipient of a termination letter and people familiar with the matter, the latest move in an onslaught of the agency by the administration of President Donald Trump.
The CFPB, a lightning rod for conservatives and the industry since it was established by Congress in 2010, was hobbled by its acting chief Russell Vought over the weekend, who ordered staff to cease all “supervision and examination activity” and said he would zero out the agency’s funding for the next quarter.
The Office of Management and Budget, where Vought is also director, did not immediately respond to a request for comment submitted outside working hours.
The White House said in a statement on Monday that the CFPB had long functioned as a “woke, weaponized arm of the bureaucracy that leverages its power against certain industries and individuals disfavored by so-called elites.”
One memo dated February 11 that was received by a staff member from Adam Martinez, the agency’s acting chief human resources officer, and seen by Reuters, said she was being terminated because her “ability, knowledge and skills do not fit the Agency’s current needs.”
The firings — which have been considered a possibility across the federal government after the White House asked agencies for lists of probationary employees and recommendations on whether they should stay — are the latest move by the administration to neutralize the CFPB.
Elizabeth Aniskevich, a senior litigation counsel in the agency’s enforcement division who started in June of last year, said she and others had received the notices Tuesday within minutes of each other.
“I have succeeded in every job that I’ve been in,” she said, adding that she had graduated in the top 5% of her law school class and was an experienced securities fraud and civil rights litigator. “I am qualified for this job.”
Trump named Vought as acting director of the consumer watchdog for financial services last week. Within days, Vought had ordered agency staff not to come to the office and to stop all work.
Top officials for enforcement and supervision said earlier they had resigned, and the deputy director has also been placed on administrative leave, according to a person familiar with the matter.
(Reporting by Douglas Gillison and Chris Prentice; Editing by Kate Mayberry)
