Jonathan McKernan could lead CFPB “imminently”

It may not be long before the federal government’s consumer watchdog has a newly-installed permanent director.

Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.), who chairs the powerful Senate Banking Committee, spoke about the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) during an appearance at the American Bankers Association (ABA)’s Washington, D.C. summit on Tuesday, which was livestreamed on social media platform X. When the moderator began to segue into the topic of the CFPB, Scott feigned surprise.

“Do we have to speak about the CFPB?” he said through a laugh.

When asked about what he is thinking about oversight of the bureau during the current administration and Congress, Scott was blunt in his assessment.

“The smaller, the better,” he said of the bureau. “Everything we can do to shrink the size of the CFPB, the better off the average consumer is. For an agency that’s supposed to protect the consumers, it made it very hard on consumers, and especially hard on small businesses.”

Scott lauded early actions by Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent when he was appointed acting CFPB director “for a few minutes,” he said. It allowed members of Congress to more directly scrutinize the bureau’s funding structure, saying that the goal is ultimately to remove any insulation it may have from the regular congressional oversight process.

“We’re looking at putting in the reconciliation vehicle, [including] capping the amount of money that comes to the CFPB,” he said. “I’d love to have a bipartisan board over the CFPB.”

He added that the philosophy is to see the banking system in terms of the opportunities it can grant to Americans.’

“I think everything we can do to move the CFPB into the normal congressional process from a budgeting perspective and oversight is better for the American consumer,” he said. “For me, I don’t think about banking from a philosophical standpoint. I think about banking as access points for credit, for resources, for homeownership [and] for small businesses. And I start at the ground, and I build my way up, because that’s what changed my life.”

When asked about the possibility that Jonathan McKernan’s nomination as CFPB director might move forward in the full Senate, Scott said it was “imminent.” But he qualified that by saying that word has a different meaning in a procedurally-focused deliberative and legislative body.

“Imminent in the Senate might mean forever, but typically means in the next month or two,” Scott said. “I think there was some consternation, honestly, in the system, because a part of the challenge is we wanted to shrink the CFPB down to the right size.”

Much has been made of the Trump administration’s efforts to cut personnel and financial resources from the CFPB, moves which continue to be challenged in the courts. But Scott said that he feels they’ve done “as much of that work” as they could before bringing in a permanent director.

“I do think we are at the point where it’s time to move forward,” he said. “I also think [Senate Majority] Leader [John] Thune is ready for more [nominations] to get through. It will be done with CFPB sometime, probably [in] early May.”

McKernan’s nomination was approved to move out of the Banking Committee and to the consideration of the full Senate more than a month ago. The nomination proceeded along party lines, with committee Democrats voicing concerns over a perceived lack of candor in answers McKernan and others submitted in response to a series of questions she had sent.

“As the director of the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection, Jonathan McKernan will ensure accountability and much needed reforms to curtail the weaponization of this rogue agency,” Sen. Scott said in a statement submitted for the record following the vote.