Elizabeth Warren is leaving the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and returning to Harvard Law School after President Obama last week nominated ex-Ohio Attorney General Richard Cordray to run the new agency.
One of her top deputies, Raj Date, will step in to fill Warren's role as special advisor to the Secretary of the Treasury effective Aug. 1, leading the CFPB’s day-to-day operations pending Cordray’s confirmation. The agency is not fully independent until a director is confirmed, nor can it exercise all of its powers. Cordray currently serves as head of enforcement at the CFPB.
An alumnus of both Capital One Financial and Deutsche Bank, Date currently serves as associate director of research, markets, & regulations at the CFPB. He earned his JD from Harvard Law School.
The CFPB was Warren’s brainchild — she first proposed such an agency in a 2007 article, “Unsafe at Any Rate.” Created as part of the Dodd-Frank financial overhaul, the bureau officially opened on July 21, its mission to protect consumers from unfair, abusive or deceptive financial practices, and promote consumer education.
But Warren was a deeply polarizing figure. As Bracewell & Guiliani partner Robert Clarke put it in an interview earlier this year, the banking industry viewed her as nothing short of “the devil incarnate.” Republicans in Congress vowed she would not be confirmed if nominated.
Warren devoted the past year getting the CFPB ready to launch as its de facto head, and Treasury Secretary Tim Geither in a statement praised her efforts.
“Professor Warren has done an extraordinary job standing up the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau,” he said. “Her efforts to simplify mortgage and credit card disclosures, protect military families from abusive and deceptive financial practices, and bring aboard top talent like Richard Cordray and Raj Date have built a strong foundation for the bureau’s future success.”
Lawyers who follow the CFPB say Warren is rumored to be a potential Democratic candidate to represent Massachusetts in the U.S. Senate.
Comments