WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, Eric Blankenstein, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s policy director for supervision, enforcement, and fair lending, has resigned following controversy over racist blog posts from 2004 in which he used racial slurs for African-Americans and claimed that most hate crimes reported by people of color were hoaxes.
Center for Responsible Lending Executive Vice President Nikitra Bailey released the following statement:
The CFPB’s decision to move the Office of Fair Lending out of Enforcement signaled its lack of commitment to ensuring a fair and inclusive financial marketplace. Eric Blankenstein’s resignation is long overdue. His history of racist statements made him unfit to police racially discriminatory lending. It’s wrong that Mr. Mulvaney and Director Kraninger allowed him to remain at the CFPB. Moving forward, we hope that the Administration will carry out the mission of the Bureau, which is to address discrimination in financial services and abusive lending practices. The CFPB should put borrowers first.
For more information, or to arrange an interview with a CRL spokesperson on this issue, please contact Vincenza Previte at vincenza.previte@responsiblelending.org.