A coalition of 22 attorneys general from Democratic-led states sued the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and its director, Russell Vought, on Monday, asserting that the White House’s argument to withhold funds from the consumer protection agency is unconstitutional. Colorado’s Attorney Ge neral Phil Weiser is among those challenging the Trump administration and appeared at a virtual news conference on Monday where he explained how the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has returned $21 billion to Americans improperly taken by businesses. Weiser appeared with attorneys general from California, Oregan and New Jersey, who said that if Trump wants to eliminate the bureau, he should work with Congress to pass legislation reversing their earlier action rather than withholding funds from it. “We have to act because Congress is not acting,” said Weiser, who has filed 48 cases against the Trump administration. The bureau was created in the wake of the Great Recession and has taken action against large banks and corporations. For example, it stopped Wells Fargo from opening accounts without customers’ consent, Oregon Attorney General Dan Rayfield said. The federal bureau also works on issues such as junk credit card fees, unfair mortgage terms, and provides important deterrence against financial abuses, the attorneys general said. Such protections are critical as Americans face an affordability crisis, they said. “Take the police officers off the road — do you have more or less speeding?” Rayfield said. President Donald Trump expressed distaste for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau during a speech in February when he called it an “ultra-left” institution. Trump said he used to get calls from the owners of small banks upset about the bureau’s actions that put pressure on those businesses and put them out of business. “They were almost crying,” he said, of the bank owners.  The lawsuit filed in Oregon challenges the Trump administration’s argument that the CFPB can only be funded by the Federal Reserve’s profits. The Federal Reserve has been running a loss since 2022, a side effect of the Fed raising interest rates sharply to combat inflation. It holds bonds that pay low interest from the pandemic but it needs to pay out higher amounts of interest to the banks that hold their deposits with the bank. The White House has argued for several months that the CFPB cannot lawfully draw funds from the Fed to support its operations if the Fed does not have “combined earnings” to allocate to the bureau. Without additional funds, the CFPB is expected to deplete its operating funds completely in January. The phrase “combined earnings” is found in the text of the Dodd-Frank Act, the law that created the CFPB more than a decade ago. Legislators and policymakers from the time Dodd-Frank was crafted have argued that the phrase “combined earnings” was not meant to infer the Fed needed to make an actual profit to fund the CFPB. The White House’s interpretation of the Dodd-Frank Act is being litigated in a separate lawsuit filed by the CFPB employees’ union against Vought. The Democratic AGs argue that the CFPB was lawfully created by Congress and the White House cannot pick and choose which parts of the government it wishes to fund or not. Further, the CFPB is required to provide consumer complaint information to the individual states to stop bad actors, and if the CFPB is not operating, it cannot meet its statutory requirements. A spokeswoman for Vought did not respond to an email for comment. The Associated Press contributed to this report. ...read more read less