The director of the Management and Budget Office (OMB) Russell Vought attends a meeting from the Cabinet to the White House in Washington, DC, United States, April 10, 2025.
Nathan Howard | Reuters
The Inspector General of the Federal Reserve examines the Trump administration attempts to dismiss almost all employees of the Consumer Financial Protection Office and cancel the Agency's contracts, CNBC learned.
The Inspector General's office told Senator Elizabeth Warren, D-MASS., And Senator Andy Kim, DN.J., that he took their request to investigate the movements of the new leadership of the Consumer Agency, according to a letter of June 6 seen by CNBC.
“We had already launched work to examine the discounts of the workforce at the CFPB” in response to a previous request from the legislators, said interim inspector general Fred Gibson in the letter. “We expand this work to include the canceled contracts of the CFPB.”
The letter confirms that the main weapons of surveillance of the United States government now examine the whirlwind of activity at the office after the acting CFPB chief of Trump, Russell Vought, took over in February. Vought told employees to stop work, while he and the agents of the Elon Musk Government Ministry sought to dismiss the majority of the agency staff and final contracts with external providers.
This prompted Warren and Kim to ask the Fed Inspector General and the Government’s responsibility to examine the legality of Vought's actions and the extent to which they hampered the CFPB mission. The GAO told legislators in April that he would examine the issue.
“While Trump dismantles vital public services, an independent investigation of the OIG is essential for understanding the damage caused by this administration at the CFPB and ensuring that he can always fulfill his mandate to work on behalf of the people and hold companies that try to cheat and scam them,” Kim told CNBC in a press release.
The FED IG office is an independent guard dog on the Fed and the CFPB, and has the power to examine the agency's files, to consult the assignments and interview. He can also refer criminal issues to the Ministry of Justice.
Shortly after its inauguration, Trump dismissed more than 17 general inspectors in federal agencies. Spared in this purge was Michael Horowitz, the IG for the Ministry of Justice since 2012, which was appointed this month of Watchdog entering for the Fed and the CFPB.
Horowitz, who begins in his new role at the end of this month, would have been congratulated by Trump supporters for having discovered problems with the FBI treatment of his Trump's 2016 campaign investigation.
Meanwhile, the fate of the CFPB depends on an imminent decision of a federal court of appeal. The judges have temporarily interrupted Vought's efforts to dismiss employees, but are now considering the call of the Trump administration on its plans for the agency.