Judge throws out CU lawsuit seeking to unseat CFPB's Mulvaney

A federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit by a New York credit union that had challenged President Trump's appointment of Mick Mulvaney as acting director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

In his decision Thursday, U.S. District Judge Paul Gardephe said the lawsuit brought by the Lower East Side People's Federal Credit Union lacked standing.

"The mere fact that plaintiff is regulated by the CFPB does not confer standing to bring this suit," Gardephe wrote in a 20-page opinion. "Plaintiff's speculation regarding the future actions of third parties is not sufficient to establish an imminent injury."

Mick Mulvaney, director of the Office of Management and Budget and acting-director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

The credit union filed the lawsuit in December claiming that Leandra English, the CFPB's deputy director, was the rightful interim head of the bureau.

"We are disappointed in the court's ruling and respectfully disagree with it," said Ilann Maazel, a lawyer for Lower East Side People's Federal Credit Union, known as LESPFCU.

The credit union had launched its legal challenge as English herself fought Mulvaney's appointment. In her own lawsuit, she argued that the Dodd-Frank Act provides for the deputy director to become the acting chief in the absence of a Senate-confirmed director. Former CFPB Director Richard Cordray, who stepped down in November, had installed English as the agency's No. 2 in the hopes that she would succeed him.

English lost her case but was granted an expedited appeal by a federal appeals court this week in her efforts to unseat Mulvaney.

The credit union has argued that because it is subject to the rulemaking authority of the CFPB, it was unclear "how much longer existing CFPB rules will remain in effect, or if planned-for CFPB rules will in fact be going into effect as expected."

The credit union, which serves mostly immigrants and low-income customers, had raised concerns that Mulvaney might change the CFPB's prepaid rule and Home Mortgage Disclosure Act requirements. Mulvaney halted the prepaid rule in late December and also said he plans to reopen the agency's HMDA rule.

Gardephe wrote that the credit union had to show it had suffered actual or concrete harm.

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Lawsuits Credit unions Mick Mulvaney CFPB
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