Rep. Waters, In Turnaround, Seeks Whistleblowers from CFPB

 

Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA), the chairwoman of the House Financial Services Committee, has invited staff members of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) to contact her office to share potentially negative information on the agency.

 

According to a Bloomberg report, Waters made the request in an open letter to the CFPB staff offering easy access to share any insight on how the agency is operating under Kathy Kraninger, who was recently sworn in as the CFPB’s second director.

 

“If, in the course of your work, you are a witness to waste, fraud, abuse or gross mismanagement, please do not hesitate to alert me and my staff,” Waters wrote. 

 

Waters’ action marks a decided change from her previous indifference to complaints by CFPB staff members during Richard Cordray’s directorship years. In 2016, Waters made no comment when the Government Accountability Office published “Consumer Financial Protection Bureau: Additional Actions Needed to Support a Fair and Inclusive Workplace,” a report that detailed how CFPB employees surveyed feared speaking out about problems in their workplace out of fear of repercussions. Two years earlier, the House Financial Services Committee investigated complaints of racial and gender discrimination in CFPB employee performance reviews. In both cases, Waters never publicly encouraged the CFPB staff to work with her office to resolve personnel problems.