White House Tip Line Tells Banks To Snitch On Financial Regulators Doing Their Jobs

The Trump administration has debuted a “tip line” for financial institutions and the public to report financial regulators who are still doing their jobs despite a White House “stand down” order.

The regulators work for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which until recent days focused on illegal fees, scams, false advertising and discrimination in the consumer-facing financial sector, which includes credit cards and mortgages.

And in recent days, they’ve been repeatedly ordered to stop doing their work ― first by Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who was named CFPB’s acting director after Trump fired CFPB’s existing director, and then by White House Budget Director Russ Vought, a key Project 2025 author who replaced Bessent as CFPB’s acting director.

But if that wasn’t enough, the administration is now encouraging financial executives to rat out any CFPB employees who have the gall to continue attempting to protect consumers.

A new “@cfpb_tipline” X account with a silver “government” badge was launched to promote the effort. It advertises the email address “[email protected].”

“Are you being pursued by CFPB enforcement or supervision staff, in violation of Acting Director Russ Vought’s stand down order? If so, DM us or send an email,” the account’s bio states.

In a statement to HuffPost, a spokesperson for Vought’s office ― who has also been detailed as a spokesperson for CFPB ― confirmed the X account’s authenticity.

“CFPB launched a tip line today,” the spokesperson said. The statement added a warning: “Now-former employees of the CFPB continued their activities after the stop-work order was first issued by Scott Bessent and any others found to be doing so will be dealt with accordingly.”

RealClearPolitics first reported the tip line.

A comment request to CFPB’s press office went unanswered. To make things more confusing, CFPB itself has an actual tip line for whistleblowers, that is, people reporting possible violations of consumer financial rights.

Trump and Elon Musk’s “DOGE” team have moved aggressively to neuter CFPB in the weeks since Trump took office. In recent days, Musk’s aides have gained full access to CFPB computer systems, several outlets reported, and top pre-Trump CFPB officials resigned following the stop-work order. The last post on CFPB’s newsroom was a one-sentence statement from Bessent on being named acting director.

The animosity could be motivated by CFPB’s scrutiny of digital payment platforms, at least on Musk and other Silicon Valley Trump donors’ parts. Musk’s X has hinted at a forthcoming partnership with Visa, “X Money,” that allows users to send money to each other.

The Post noted that in recent months, CFPB had doled out penalties to Apple and Cash App, had sued several banks that jointly own Zelle, and was investigating Meta over potential misuse of financial data.

“CFPB RIP,” Musk wrote on X last week as DOGE aides reportedly gained access to CFPB systems.

A couple weeks after Trump’s election, he similarly called to “delete CFPB” because “there are too many duplicative regulatory agencies.” The Bureau’s website homepage and X account remain unavailable, and the Bureau’s office has been closed for the week.

The National Treasury Employees Union, which represents CFPB employees, has filed two lawsuits against Vought ― the first alleging improper “DOGE” access to employees’ personal information, the latter arguing his efforts to “halt” the Bureau’s work violate separation of powers principles.

The world’s richest man has claimed he will recuse himself from any conflicts of interest in the course of his White House work. Asked if it was a conflict of interest for DOGE to be involved in CFPB, given Musk’s involvement in X and X’s digital payments capabilities, the dual OMB-CFPB spokesperson did not respond.

The Bureau, created in 2010 as part of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, was the brainchild of now-Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.). It was targeted by Trump in his first term as well.

“Vought is giving big banks and giant corporations the green light to scam families,” Warren wrote Saturday after Vought ordered CFPB staff to stop issuance of rules, the pursuit of investigations, and the release of public communications.

“The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has returned over $21 billion to families cheated by Wall Street. Republicans have failed to gut it in Congress and in the courts. They will fail again.”

That night, Vought requested $0 in additional quarterly Federal Reserve funding for the Bureau, claiming the agency had enough money already on hand.

“This spigot, long contributing to CFPB’s unaccountability, is now being turned off,” he said. In a press release on Monday, two days later, the White House called CFPB “another woke, weaponized arm of the bureaucracy” and said, “Under the administration of President Donald J. Trump, the weaponization ends right now.”