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  • CFPB Succession: Mulvaney pleads for Congress to restructure the CFPB; oral arguments held in English litigation

    Federal Issues

    On April 11 and 12, acting Director of the CFPB, Mick Mulvaney, testified before the House Financial Services Committee and the Senate Banking Committee regarding the Bureau’s semi-annual report to Congress. (Previously covered by InfoBytes here). Mulvaney’s prepared testimony, which was submitted to both committees, covers the salient points of the semi-annual report but also includes the same request to Congress that he made in the report: change the law “in order to establish meaningful accountability for the Bureau.” This request, which includes four specific changes (such as, subjecting the Bureau to the Congressional appropriations process and creating an independent Inspector General for the Bureau), was the focus of many of Mulvaney’s responses to questions posed by members of each committee. Specifically, during the House Financial Services hearing, Mulvaney encouraged the members of the committee to include the CFPB restructure in negotiations with the Senate regarding the bipartisan regulatory reform bill, S.2155, which passed the Senate last month. (Previously covered by InfoBytes here).

    Mulvaney also fielded many questions regarding the Bureau’s announcement that it plans to reconsider the final rule addressing payday loans, vehicle title loans, and certain other extensions of credit (Rule); however, his responses gave little indication of what the Bureau’s specific plans for the Rule are. As previously covered by InfoBytes, resolutions have been introduced in the House and the Senate to overturn the rule under the Congressional Review Act. Additionally, on April 9, two payday loan trade groups filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas asking the court to set aside the Rule because, among other reasons, the CFPB is unconstitutional and the Bureau’s rulemaking failed to comply with the Administrative Procedure Act. The complaint alleges that the Rule is “outside the Bureau's constitutional and statutory authority, as well as unnecessary, arbitrary, capricious, overreaching, procedurally improper and substantially harmful to lenders and borrowers alike.” The complaint also argues that the rule is a product of an agency that violates the Constitution’s separation of powers due to the Bureau’s structure of a single director who may only be removed by the president “for cause.” A similar argument in CFPB v. PHH Corporation was recently rejected by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit (covered by a Buckley Sandler Special Alert).

    Additionally, on April 12, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit heard oral arguments in English v. Trump. In this suit, Leandra English, the current deputy director of the CFPB, challenges Mulvaney’s appointment as acting director. Unlike previous arguments, which focused on the president’s authority to appoint Mulvaney under the Federal Vacancies Reform Act (FVRA), the court spent considerable time discussing Mulvaney’s concurrent role as head of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), and whether that dual role is inconsistent with the independent structure of the Bureau, as established by the Dodd-Frank Act.

    Federal Issues CFPB Succession Payday Lending Senate Banking Committee House Financial Services Committee Appellate D.C. Circuit CFPB English v. Trump Single-Director Structure

  • Buckley Sandler Special Alert: D.C. Circuit significantly narrows FCC’s order defining autodialer

    Courts

    On March 16, the D.C. Circuit issued its much-anticipated ruling in ACA International v. FCC. The D.C. Circuit’s ruling significantly narrows a Federal Communication Commission order from 2015, which, among other things, had broadly defined an “autodialer” for purposes of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act.

    * * *

    Click here to read the full special alert.

    If you have questions about the ruling or other related issues, please visit our Class Actions practice page, or contact a Buckley Sandler attorney with whom you have worked in the past.

    Courts FCC Appellate D.C. Circuit TCPA Special Alerts Autodialer ACA International

  • Supreme Court denies writ challenging data breach standing

    Courts

    On February 20, the U.S. Supreme Court denied without comment a medical insurance company’s petition for writ of certiorari to challenge an August 2017 D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals decision, which reversed the dismissal of a data breach suit filed by the company’s policyholders in 2015. According to the D.C. Circuit opinion, the policyholders sued the medical insurance company after the company announced that an unauthorized party had accessed personal information for 1.1 million members. The lower court dismissed the policyholder’s case, holding that they did not have standing because they could not show an actual injury based on the data breach. In reversing the lower court’s decision, the D.C. Circuit, citing the Supreme Court ruling in Spokeo, Inc. v. Robins, held that it was plausible that the unauthorized party “has both the intent and the ability to use [the] data for ill.” This was sufficient to show that the policyholders had standing to bring the claims because they alleged a plausible risk of future injury.

    Courts Privacy/Cyber Risk & Data Security Spokeo Class Action U.S. Supreme Court Appellate D.C. Circuit Data Breach

  • D.C. Circuit will not rehear False Claims suit against national bank

    Courts

    On February 16, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit denied a petition for an en banc rehearing of its December 2017 ruling affirming the dismissal of a False Claims Act suit against a national bank. The petition resulted from a 2013 lawsuit filed by a consumer against the bank, which alleged, among other things, that the bank falsely asserted that it had complied with certain obligations under the 2012 National Mortgage Settlement (the “Settlement”). The district court dismissed the suit, finding that the consumer lacked standing because he did not exhaust the required dispute resolution procedures contained in the Settlement. In December 2017, the D.C. Circuit affirmed the dismissal but disagreed with the lower court’s reasoning. According to the appellate opinion, the circuit court held that the consumer’s second amended complaint did not contain any allegedly false or deceptive statements made by the bank to the government-approved settlement monitor and that ultimately, “the decisive point is that the Monitor was aware of the practices and concluded that [the bank] was in compliance.”

    Courts False Claims Act / FIRREA Appellate D.C. Circuit

  • D.C. Circuit Court Affirms Dismissal of Suit, FCA First-to-File Bar Applies

    Courts

    In an opinion handed down on July 25, the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit affirmed a district court’s dismissal of a False Claims Act (FCA) suit because it violated the first-to-file bar, ruling that a relator must re-file a qui tam action and cannot merely amend a complaint where the relator’s complaint was filed when a related qui tam case was still pending. The first-to-file bar provides that if an individual brings an action under the FCA, “no person other than the Government may intervene or bring a related action based on the facts underlying the pending action.”

    The case concerned a qui tam relator who claimed that a telecommunications company overbilled on government contracts, thereby violating the FCA, which “penalizes the knowing submission of a false or fraudulent claim for payment to the federal government.” While the first suit was still pending, the relator filed a second suit alleging that the fraud was more widespread. The related suit was then resolved, but a district court dismissed the second suit based on the FCA’s first-to-file bar, which the D.C. Circuit affirmed. In 2015, the U.S. Supreme Court granted the relator’s petition for certiorari, and vacated the D.C. Circuit’s decision, citing a holding in Kellogg Brown & Root Services, Inc., et al v. Carter, 135 S. Ct. 1970 (2015), in which the Court claimed that the first-to-file bar only applies when a previous suit is pending—not once it has been resolved. Therefore, once the first-filed suit has been resolved, the first-to-file bar “no longer prohibits bringing a new action.” Because the statute of limitations period had run while the case was being appealed to the Supreme Court, the relator sought to amend his complaint rather than file a new action. The defendant moved to dismiss, and the district court granted the defendant’s motion. The relator appealed the ruling back to the D.C. Circuit, but the appellate court sided with the defendants and dismissed the relator’s action without prejudice. However, the appellate court expressly declined to opine on whether the statute of limitations would be equitably tolled if the relator were to re-file his complaint.

    Courts Litigation Appellate D.C. Circuit False Claims Act / FIRREA

  • D.C. Circuit Finds District Court Lacks Jurisdiction in Case Alleging Violations of D.C. Consumer Protection Laws

    Consumer Finance

    On July 26, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit vacated the district court’s ruling, opining that the plaintiffs in a putative class action failed to establish Article III standing to file suit in federal court. Hancock v. Urban Outfitters, Inc., No. 14-7047, WL 3996710 (D.C. Cir. July 26, 2016). In 2013, the consumer plaintiffs filed a complaint alleging that two D.C. retail stores violated the Identification Information Act, D.C. Code § 47-3151 et seq., and D.C. Consumer Protection Procedure Act, D.C. Code § 28-3901 et seq., by requesting the plaintiffs’ zip codes at the time of purchase. The district court dismissed the complaint, concluding that the plaintiffs had failed to state a claim. As such, the district court ruled that it was unnecessary to address the stores’ jurisdictional argument that the plaintiffs failed to plead an injury sufficient for Article III standing. Citing the recent Spokeo v. Robins Supreme Court ruling, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit disagreed: “The Supreme Court’s decision in Spokeo thus closes the door on [the plaintiffs’] claim that the Stores’ mere request for a zip code, standing alone, amounted to an Article III injury.” “Because the plaintiffs have not alleged any concrete injury in fact stemming from alleged violations of D.C. law,” the D.C. Circuit held that “the district court lacked jurisdiction to decide the merits of the case.”  The D.C. Circuit vacated the district court’s judgment on the merits and remanded with instructions to dismiss the complaint.

    Consumer Finance Appellate D.C. Circuit Spokeo

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