In a 51-47 vote on April 18, the U.S. Senate voted in favor of invalidating 2013 guidance from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau that targeted purported discrimination in the automobile finance market. The resolution passed on party lines, with Senator Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) the lone Democrat to join Republicans in voting to overturn the guidance.

As we reported here, Senator Jerry Moran (R-Kan.) introduced a resolution in March to overturn the CFPB's highly controversial Bulletin 2013-02, which set forth the CFPB's interpretation of the Equal Credit Opportunity Act ("ECOA") as applied to pricing in indirect automobile lending. The Bulletin targeted dealer markups, a practice whereby an automobile dealer charges a consumer a higher interest rate than the rate at which an indirect lender is willing to purchase the consumer's retail installment contract. The Bureau expressed concern that indirect lenders afforded too much pricing discretion to dealers, potentially opening the door to discrimination against protected groups, including women, African–Americans, and Hispanics. Further, the Bureau also announced in the Bulletin its intent to use a disparate treatment or disparate impact theory to hold an indirect auto lender liable for allowing prohibited pricing differences created by a dealer's conduct.

In March 2017, Senator Pat Toomey (R-Penn.) asked the Government Accountability Office whether the Bulletin qualified as a rule subject to Congressional review. The GAO concluded that the Bulletin was indeed a rule and, as a result, should have been subject to Congressional review. Based on the decision, Toomey co-sponsored with Moran the resolution to kill the guidance.

The resolution moves now to the House of Representatives for a vote.

The Troutman Sanders' Consumer Financial Services Law Monitor blog offers timely updates regarding the financial services industry to inform you of recent changes in the law, upcoming regulatory deadlines and significant judicial opinions that may impact your business. To view the blog, click here

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