The TABS Act of 2025 would fundamentally reshape the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) by converting it from a bureau within the Federal Reserve System into an independent agency named the Consumer Financial Empowerment Agency (CFEA). The bill would remove the CFPB’s current status as a bureau of the Fed, rename all references to align with the new agency, and place the agency on the regular congressional appropriations track (instead of being funded through the Federal Reserve system). In addition, the act would require a broad set of conforming amendments to numerous federal laws to reflect the new agency name and status across a wide range of consumer financial protection, banking, mortgage, credit, and privacy laws. A notable feature is that the bill authorizes only a two-year appropriation window (fiscal years 2026 and 2027) for the agency’s operations, with “such sums as may be necessary” for those years. The overall effect would be to shift governance, funding, and legal references from the CFPB/Bureau model to a standalone, independently funded agency with a renamed mandate as the Consumer Financial Empowerment Agency.
Key Points
- 1Name change and organizational status: The bill would transform the CFPB from a “bureau” within the Federal Reserve System into an independent agency called the Consumer Financial Empowerment Agency, removing references to the Fed’s governance structure and placing it outside the Federal Reserve.
- 2Funding through regular appropriations: The agency would transition to the regular congressional appropriations process, with explicit authorization of appropriations for fiscal years 2026 and 2027, rather than continuing to be funded through the Federal Reserve system.
- 3Broad conforming amendments: The bill would rewrite dozens of federal laws and codes (including Dodd-Frank, the Truth in Lending and Truth in Savings Acts, the Fair Credit Reporting Act, the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, the Equal Credit Opportunity Act, and others) to replace references to the Bureau or CFPB with the Consumer Financial Empowerment Agency and to reflect the agency’s status outside the Fed.
- 4Deemed name change across laws: A general provision ensures that any reference in law, regulation, or official document to the “Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection” would be treated as a reference to the “Consumer Financial Empowerment Agency,” enabling a uniform transition across the statutory landscape.
- 5Expanded cross‑agency terminology updates: In addition to consumer protection statutes, the bill amends numerous related acts and titles (including the Electronic Fund Transfer Act, the Federal Deposit Insurance Act, the Financial Institutions Reform, Recovery, and Enforcement Act, TELEVISING acts, and others) to reflect the new agency name and status.