John Czwartacki, a valued member of the White House communications team, has been named the chief communications officer at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
Czwartacki, known to most simply as “CZ,” is shifting from the spokesman for the Office of Management and Budget and following his boss Mick Mulvaney fulltime to the bureau.
It’s the latest indication that Mulvaney, the bureau’s acting director and OMB director, has big plans for the bureau, which the administration has moved to pull in and focus.
Mulvaney recently told Congress, “The bureau’s new strategic priorities are to recognize free markets and consumer choice and to take a prudent, consistent, and humble approach to enforcing the law. This reflects my understanding that consumers and creditors alike gain from mutual exchange, provided that promises are kept, terms are clearly disclosed, and property rights are protected.”
Czwartacki is credited for inventing the term “MAGAnomics,” a reference to the president’s economic growth blueprint.
His post will not be filled at OMB but key communicators are being promoted in the budget shop.
He is also a bureau strategist and effective administration crisis communicator. He proved his value last week when Mulvaney was skewered for saying that as a congressman he listened to out of town lobbyists who were also donors.
For example, when Ohio Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown called on Mulvaney to resign from the CFPB, Czwartacki said Brown was finally accepting Mulvaney as the chief of the bureau, something Democrats dispute.
According to the Washington Post, Czwartacki said, “It is a breath of fresh air to hear Sen. Brown join a number fellow Democrats and acknowledge Mick Mulvaney as the acting director of the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection. That’s a big step forward.”
