In April the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), headed by low-rent Dracula Mick Mulvaney, announced that banking giant Wells Fargo had agreed to a $1 billion settlement over one of their many fraudulent schemes. Reading this news, most people’s reaction was that Wells Fargo had to be incredibly guilty to need to agree to anything with this current administration. Wells Fargo was under investigation for a slew of fraudulent practices like creating delays and charging prospective borrowers for those delays, and automatically enrolling millions of people for car insurance they did not ask for or agree to pay for, resulting in the bank illegally repossessing people’s cars. The Intercept’s David Dayen reports that the “deal” with Wells Fargo, manufactured by Mick Mulvaney, is unique in how bogus and corrupt it is.
But according to the language in the settlement agreement, in order for homeowners and auto loan customers to receive restitution, they would have to identify an “economic or other cognizable harm” based mainly on a specific violation of federal law, under a standard created and judged by Wells Fargo. CFPB does get to audit the remediation plans, but there’s no mechanism for forcing the bank to change those plans outside of going to a court and claiming noncompliance with the settlement.
Consumer attorneys who have reviewed the agreement claim that this creates large and unnecessary hurdles for victims. “How many consumers do you think will be able to complete and document the claim forms that Wells will engineer?” asked O. Max Gardner, a highly regarded consumer bankruptcy attorney. “One percent at best. This is a scam by Mulvaney and Company.”
According to people who have worked for the CFPB before Trump’s rise to power, this is an unprecedented way to word a settlement agreement of this kind. The only thing it does is put the burden of proof on the victimized party.
So now, a person who “defaulted” on a bogus $15,000 loan and insurance deal that was rigged to defraud them has to come up with the money to investigate and litigate their settlement money against one of the largest banks in the world—that also happens to be guilty of defrauding millions of Americans over the past decade. The deal, under Mick Mulvaney is not surprising in that, like every single person Donald Trump has installed in our government, Mulvaney is openly on the dole to big business.
None of this is normal. It’s the most base form of corruption, plain and simple.