A federal appeals court has rejected a Trump administration request for permission to trim the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s workforce by more than half, instead sending the case back to a lower court.
In March, Trump administration attorneys requested permission from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit to move forward with a reduction-in-force plan to shrink the CFPB’s staffing from 1,174 to 556 employees. In February 2025, CFPB Acting Director Russell Vought announced plans to reduce the bureau’s headcount by 90%, which prompted a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for D.C. filed by the National Treasury Employees Union. District Court Judge Amy Berman Jackson issued a preliminary injunction stopping the reduction-in-force plan from proceeding, and the CFPB appealed.
In March of this year, Vought filed with the court a revised workforce reduction plan (WRP) that would shrink CFPB headcount to around 556 employees, requesting permission to begin the layoffs. The appeals court declined to consider the WRP and instead remanded the case to Judge Jackson, the news site Law360 reported.
Both Vought and President Trump have said they want to close the CFPB and have taken steps to shrink the agency. In addition to attempting to reduce its workforce and funding, the Office of the Comptroller last year terminated the lease for the CFPB headquarters six years early.
