On May 16, 2024, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a significant
opinion in Consumer Financial Protection Bureau v. Community
Financial Services Association of America, Ltd., upholding the
funding structure of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
(CFPB).
601 U.S. 416. In a
previous post, we reported that on October 3, 2023, the Supreme
Court heard oral arguments in this matter on the issue of whether
the CFPB's funding mechanism violates the Appropriations Clause
of the U.S. Constitution (U.S. Const. art I § 9, cl. 7). In a
7-2 decision, the Supreme Court held that the statute which
authorized the CFPB to obtain funds from the earnings of the
Federal Reserve satisfied the Appropriations Clause. As maintained
by the CFPB in its opening brief, this challenge to the CFPB's
funding structure "threaten[ed] profound disruption by calling
into question virtually every action the CFPB has taken in the 12
years since its creation." Justice Thomas delivered the
opinion for
