Supreme Court Backs President’s Power to Fire CFPB Director

A divided U.S. Supreme Court said the president has broad power to fire the director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, ruling that Congress went too far in trying to insulate the agency from political pressure.

The justices on Monday backed the Trump administration in the separation-of-powers clash, striking down a provision in the 2010 Dodd-Frank Act that protected the director from being fired. The court stopped short of abolishing the agency altogether.

The ruling marks a major change for the CFPB, the brainchild of now-Senator Elizabeth Warren created after the 2008 financial crisis to regulate credit cards, auto ...