CFPB says bank supervisors must take 'humility oath'

Al Drago/Bloomberg

• Key Insight: The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's new "Humility Pledge" is mandated for all supervisory examiners, with a focus on pressing threats to consumers, particularly service members and veterans. 
• What's at Stake: The CFPB said it wants to avoid duplication of supervision with state regulators and reduce the 8-week exam cycle.  
• Expert Quote: "Starting today, Supervision Division Examiners will be reading a 'Humility Pledge' to each supervised entity before conducting exams," the bureau said.
  

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau said it is requiring supervisory examiners to take a new 'humility pledge,' which must be read out loud to examined institutions before conducting exams.

On Friday, the CFPB sent a copy of the 'humility pledge' in an emailed press release and immediately received pushback from current and former CFPB officials. The CFPB described supervision under former CFPB Director Rohit Chopra as "thuggery" and a "weaponized arm of the CFPB." 

 "Starting today, Supervision Division Examiners will be reading a 'Humility Pledge' to each supervised entity before conducting exams," the bureau said in the emailed release. "Where these exams were previously done with unnecessary personnel, outrageous travel expenses, and with the thuggery pervasive in prior leadership, they will now be done respectfully, promptly, professionally, and under budget."

Of major interest to banks, the CFPB pledge states that the agency will "avoid, where possible, duplication of supervision, where States or other regulators are already doing that job."

To be sure, the CFPB has not conducted any supervisory or enforcement exams this year, according to several lawyers that represent banks and the bureau's union. Moreover, lawyers representing financial firms said it is unclear that acting CFPB Director Russel Vought has said the CFPB will likely run out of money by year-end and he hopes to shut the agency down.

Current and former CFPB employees said the oath was one way for the Trump administration to get employees to resign. Vought has broadcast that his goal is to terrorize federal employees. The CFPB's union sued him in February and a district court issued a preliminary injunction in March prohibiting mass layoffs. However, an appeals court ruled that Vought can lay off up to 90% of the bureau's staff, though that ruling is on appeal.

Going forward, the CFPB said it will focus its supervision resources "on pressing threats to consumers, particularly service members and their families, and veterans, and in the areas that are clearly within the Bureau's statutory authority." 

Joann Needleman, a member of the law firm Clark Hill, said industry clients are questioning whether there will be any exams next year.  

"My experience in the last two years was that the CFPB examiners were more than accommodating," she said. "I had no issues with examiners."

 As part of its criticisms of the Biden-era agency, the bureau said it will no longer ask supervised banks for "expansive data sets or other information which may seem unrelated to the exam or include information inconsistent with Bureau priorities."

Supervisory examiners, the bureau said, will no longer "ask invasive and irrelevant questions, demanding expansive information they do not need." 

Trump administration

CFPB transfers enforcement to DOJ, furloughs some staff

November 20, 2025 6:19 PM

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau plans to transfer its entire enforcement and legal divisions to the Department of Justice and will furlough almost all staff in those units, according to sources briefed by agency leadership.

The one-page pledge says the 2026 examination cycle "is going to be fundamentally different from the prior ones under the former Director Chopra." For example, exam times will be cut from the current eight weeks, and examiners "will be encouraged and incentivized to complete the work promptly and under budget."

The CFPB's press release referred to a former supervision director, Lorelei Salas, as a "former Soros activist," a reference to billionaire investor and Democratic Party stalwart George Soros, long a target for the Republican base. 

"Today, the CFPB made changes to how the Supervision Division conducts exams," the emailed release said. "Previously, under the leadership of Director Chopra and Biden's Director of Supervision Lorelei Salas, a former Soros activist who was put on leave in February 2025, this division was the weaponized arm of the CFPB."

Tyler Creighton, a CFPB union member, called the pledge and press release "incredibly disrespectful." 

"Supervision's workers have always conducted examinations professionally, efficiently, conscientiously, and with a focus on remedying consumer harm," he said. "We will continue to do so, just as soon as Donald Trump and Russell Vought end the nearly 10-month suspension of examinations and let us get back to work for the American people."

Mike Pierce, executive director at Protect Borrowers, an advocacy group for student loan borrowers, and a former CFPB senior advisor, said the intent of the pledge appears to be to embarrass CFPB staff. 

"The only people they're embarrassing are themselves," Pierce said. "If anyone should be taking a humility pledge, it's Russell Vought and his team of minions at the CFPB, who have intentionally put the watchdog on ice while the economy crumbles around them."