Trump fires CFPB head Rohit Chopra

President Donald Trump has fired Rohit Chopra, the director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). In a letter posted to X, Chopra confirmed his “term as CFPB Director has concluded.” Chopra was notified of his removal via an email from the White House, according to a report from the Associated Press.

During Chopra’s tenure, which began in 2021, the CFPB took an aggressive approach to regulating tech companies and financial institutions. The CFPB most recently proposed limiting data brokers’ ability to sell personal data in the US. It sued major US banks for “widespread fraud” on Zelle and also issued a rule that would put digital payment services like Apple Pay, Google Wallet, and PayPal under bank-like supervision — something it’s now facing a lawsuit over.

Trump was widely expected to fire Chopra before the director’s term came to an end in October 2026. “With so much power concentrated in the hands of a few, agencies like the CFPB have never been more critical,” Chopra wrote in his letter. “We’ve led efforts across the government to stop the scourge of junk fees in banking and across sectors of the economy, to tame the harmful impacts of medical bills riddled with errors, and to limit the creep of surveillance by data brokers that puts our sensitive data in the hands of foreign adversaries.”

Since taking office last month, Trump has pushed out many of the officials appointed by the Biden administration, replacing them with his own allies. Elon Musk, who is leading the government’s efforts to cut spending, said the US should “delete” the CFPB last year.

Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) responded to Chopra’s departure by saying Trump will need a “strong CFPB and a strong CFPB” director to achieve goals of capping credit card interest rates and lowering costs. “If President Trump and Republicans decide to cower to Wall Street billionaires and destroy the agency, they will have a fight on their hands,” Warren said.