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February 2025 • Issue 25:02:01

New Congress has plenty on its plate

Durbin 2.0 won't go away

No sooner had members been seated and given their com-
mittee assignments in the new Congress than commercials
began running on Washington, D.C. television stations
panning the Credit Card Competition Act as a give-away to
big box stores and a disaster for mom-and-pop shops.

While the legislation had yet to be introduced, the commer-
cials referred to it as the "Durbin-Marshall plan," referenc-
ing the two senators who originally introduced it: Senators
Richard Durbin, D-Ill., and Roger Marshall, R-Kan.

The legislation has been panned broadly by the financial
services industry, which has coalesced under the banner
of the Electronic Payments Coalition. In June 2023, the bill
gained as a co-signer Senator J.D. Vance, R-Ohio. His sup-
port may have waned, however. In January, The Washing-
ton Reporter, a news site serving Capitol Hill and executive
By Patti Murphy branch staffers, reported that the EPC had contributed $1
million to President Trump's inaugural committee.
he 119th U.S. Congress has barely begun, yet
lobbyists are already gearing up for a fight over That followed the release of a study by EPC detailing how
the Credit Card Competition Act. Introduced the bill, if enacted, could cost the U.S. economy $227 billion
T as a bipartisan bill in both houses of the last and 156,000 jobs over the space of four years. The data was
Congress, it would require merchant choice over which based on an analysis by economic forecaster Oxford Eco-
networks are used to process credit and debit card pay- nomics Research.
ments they accept.
The research warned that the impact on popular tourist
But this is not the only activity in Washington that could spots could be "catastrophic," comparing it to the downturn
affect the payments sector. There will be battles involving following the COVID outbreak. Analysts believe that the
the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Opposition is bill, if enacted, would likely force card-issuing banks to
building over the CFPB's data sharing rule, as well as a pro- scale back credit cards or rewards.
posal that would subject earned wage access products to
federal credit laws, notably the Truth-in-Lending Act and
its corresponding rule set, Regulation Z.
Contributed articles inside by:
The CFPB's funding also will come under fire. Currently,
the agency receives its operating income from the Federal
Reserve, which wrote many of the consumer protection Allen Kopelman .....................................................................................16
regulations it enforces. Some in Congress, including Repre- Adam Atlas ..............................................................................................18
sentative Andy Barr, R-Ky., who chairs the House Financial
Services Committee, complain that its funding source ex- Ken Musante ..........................................................................................24
empts the agency from congressional oversight.
Sharan Shah............................................................................................25
Cryptocurrency will also be a hot topic for the 119th Con- Roger Alexander ...................................................................................27
gress as it works with the Trump Administration.

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