President Trump will nominate budget aide Kathy Kraninger to be the director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, a White House official said Saturday.
If confirmed, she will replace Mick Mulvaney, Trump’s budget director who has been running the watchdog agency on an acting basis.
A White House representative said that Kraninger “will bring a fresh perspective and much-needed management experience to the BCFP, which has been plagued by excessive spending, dysfunctional operations, and politicized agendas.”
In picking Kraninger, Trump is opting for someone viewed as a strong manager but without much background in finance. She is currently an associate director of the Office of Management and Budget, serving under Mulvaney in his primary role. In that position, Kraninger oversees the budget with respect to the financial regulatory agencies, but otherwise she doesn’t have experience relevant to the CFPB portfolio.
Trump was facing a deadline: He had to have a nominee to the bureau post by next week, or else Mulvaney would be forced to leave. With a replacement officially named, Mulvaney will be able to stay on until she is confirmed. Last week, Mulvaney told reporters that he expected to remain at the agency until well into the fall, given the slow pace of Senate confirmations.
The White House statement described Kraninger as a “staunch supporter of free enterprise” who would further the reforms begun by Mulvaney. In his half year-plus at the agency, Mulvaney has sought to refocus the CFPB, as it has been known, from aggressively policing markets to, instead, easing regulatory burdens. His moves have provoked outcries from Democrats in Congress, who have accused him of doing favors for banks, payday lenders, and other financial firms overseen by the bureau.
Among other changes, Mulvaney has rearranged the name of the bureau from the CFPB to the BCFP, standing for Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection.
Yet the 43 year-old Kraninger, who previously worked for the Department of Homeland Security and as a Senate aide, doesn’t have the background in financial policy that Mulvaney had. Before joining the Trump administration, Mulvaney was a member of the House Financial Services Committee as a representative of South Carolina.
One critic, Karl Frisch of the progressive group Allied Progress, suggested Saturday that the White House chose a weaker candidate knowing that it “buys them more time with Mulvaney at the helm.” As long as the Senate does not confirm Kraninger, Mulvaney does not have to leave the agency.
White House staff, however, said that their hope is for Kraninger to be confirmed promptly.
J.W. Verret, a former staffer to the conservative House Financial Services Committee chairman Jeb Hensarling, also discounted Kraninger’s candidacy. Verret compared the nomination to that of George W. Bush’s unsuccessful attempt to name Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court.
Mulvaney said that he would work with the incoming nominee, when named to help prepare him or her for the job.
