Vought capitulates to court order, asks for CFPB funding

Bloomberg News

• What's at Stake: The request to fund the CFPB ends weeks of uncertainty about the agency's future. 
• Supporting Data: In November, the Department of Justice's Office of Legal Counsel took the position that Vought could not lawfully make a funding request because the Fed has no earnings. 
• Key Insight: A federal judge ruled last month that Vought's refusal violated an existing injunction and could subject Vought to penalties of contempt of court. 

Russell Vought has agreed to request funding for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, capitulating to a judge's order that would have held him in contempt if he failed to fund the agency.

On Friday, the CFPB notified the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia that Vought has prepared and submitted the required funding request to the Federal Reserve for $145 million in the CFPB's fiscal second quarter. The CFPB is funded through the Federal Reserve System rather than congressional appropriations. Congress slashed the agency's budget last year, capping it at $445 million, down from $785.4 million in 2024. The bulk of the bureau's budget pays for employee salaries. 

The request ends weeks of uncertainty about the CFPB's future. In November, the Department of Justice's Office of Legal Counsel took the position that Vought could not lawfully make a funding request because the Fed has no earnings — which the court rejected. 

Notwithstanding its prior position, the DOJ filed the notice informing the court that Vought had prepared the funding request "in accordance with this Court's order dated Dec. 30, 2025." 

Trump administration

With CFPB nominee lapse, Vought continues as acting director

January 9, 2026 1:32 PM

Last month, District Court Judge Amy Berman Jackson ruled that Vought's refusal to request funding for the CFPB violates an existing injunction. She found that the combined earnings of the Fed means "everything the Federal Reserve earns." Her order made it clear that a failure to seek funding could subject Vought to the penalties for contempt.

Judge Jackson stated in her order that "the claimed 'lapse' in funding, which was manufactured by the defendants based solely on the OLC Memo, is not a valid justification for the agency's unilateral decision to abandon its obligations under the injunction."

She further stated that the statutory text of the Dodd-Frank Act governs the funding of the CFPB and prescribes a process through which the bureau is to request the funding it needs "to carry out the mission it was assigned by Congress, and the Federal Reserve must provide that funding from its 'combined earnings.' " 

The process of the CFPB asking for funding from the Fed "has unfolded seamlessly since the Bureau was established in 2011, even in the years since 2022 when the Federal Reserve's interest expenses have exceeded its earnings," she wrote. 

The CFPB attached a copy of the request for funding in which Vought said that he continued to "disagree with the opinion and order of the District Court for the District of Columbia."