Russell Vought, acting director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, is asking a federal appeals court for permission to lay off more than half of the agency’s remaining workforce. Although a significant reduction in previous retrenchment efforts, it highlights the sentiment reported earlier this week that the CFPB is not going away.
one in Proposal filed on March 31, 2026 (PDF file), the government presented a “workforce restructuring plan” that would retain 556 of the CFPB’s currently employed 1,174 employees. This is a decrease of approximately 53% from current staffing levels.
The filing came at the request of Judge Cornelia Millet, who asked the government to share its downsizing plans with the court. Any staff cuts at the agency are currently blocked by a preliminary injunction issued by a federal district court through March 2025, which would require the CFPB to rehire terminated employees, reinstate voided contracts and avoid further layoffs.
From near shutdown to 50% reduction in workforce
The revised plan represents a change from the Administration’s prior stance on dismantling the CFPB. When Acting Director Watt first took command of the agency in early 2025, the government was accused of attempting to close the bureau entirely. The district court found that the CFPB was working on a “plan” to “completely shut down the agency”, which formed the basis for the preliminary injunction.
In the new filing, the government clearly states that “CFPB leadership will not close the agency” and the revised plan “replaces any and all previous plans with respect to reductions in force and any prior decisions regarding the appropriate size or functioning of the agency.” Vought’s March 31 memo declares those prior plans and decisions “null and void.”
The memorandum outlines, division by division, what statutory functions the agency will continue to perform and how many employees are needed to perform them.
In which departments will the biggest cuts be made?
The largest cuts in absolute terms will affect the supervision division, which will drop from 350 onboard employees to 77 (a 78% reduction). The enforcement division will reduce from 137 employees to 50, a 64% reduction. The operations division will go from 255 to 133 employees.
Some offices will almost disappear. The Foreign Affairs Division will reduce from 30 employees to only 5. The director’s office will be reduced from 62 to 15 employees.
The legal division is set to retain all 60 onboard employees, while consumer feedback and education will retain 90 of the 127 employees. The plan argues that consumer response is “largely automated” and can operate with less staff, especially as the CFPB implements additional technology to screen out fraud and duplicate complaints.
The plan also shows that the CFPB has already dismissed or withdrawn 41 enforcement actions filed under former Director Rohit Chopra, many of which have been characterized as “agency overreach.” Only 8 enforcement cases were pending as of December 31, 2025.
What does this mean for consumers
The CFPB was created by the Dodd-Frank Act in 2010 to protect consumers in the financial markets. It oversees banks, credit unions, mortgage lenders, debt collectors and other financial companies.
The agency’s Consumer Response Division handles public complaints, the Enforcement Division takes legal action against companies that violate consumer financial laws, and the Supervision Division conducts examinations of large financial institutions.
Under the proposed plan, the consumer complaint hotline and database would remain operational, and the agency says the Office of Financial Education would retain most of its staff. The government’s filing argues that none of the services the plaintiffs rely on in the case (including complaint management, educational resources and the student loan ombudsman) will be eliminated.
For borrowers, particularly those with student loans, the plan specifies that the Deputy Director will serve as the student loan ombudsman.
The significant reduction in supervision and enforcement staff raises questions about how aggressively the CFPB will police financial firms moving forward. The plan envisages reducing supervisory examinations from 107 in 2024 to 64 in 2026, with smaller teams conducting shorter, more targeted reviews. The agency says it will focus supervision on depository institutions, actual consumer fraud and areas “clearly within its statutory authority”—a departure from what the filing characterized as “novel legal principles” adopted under the prior administration.
However, Chi Chi Wu, director of consumer reporting and data advocacy at the National Consumer Law Center, says, “This latest effort to eliminate essential staff at the CFPB will turn the Bureau into an empty shell, incapable of carrying out the functions statutorily required of the CFPB. The people need a strong, independent CFPB tasked with addressing dishonest practices by credit reporting companies, Wall Street banks, and large corporations.“
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