Peter Conti-Brown, Columnist

Battle Over Bank Watchdog Whiffs on the Law

Trump can pick a Consumer Financial Protection Bureau chief. He just can't pick Mick Mulvaney.

December 15, 2017 at 1:00 PM UTC

Peter Conti-Brown is an assistant professor at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. He is a financial historian and legal scholar and the author of "The Power and Independence of the Federal Reserve."

Not this guy.
Photographer: Alex Wong/Getty Images

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President Donald Trump says he has the legal right to put his budget director in charge of the agency that enforces consumer protection rules for banks. Democrats say that the outgoing director gets to make the choice.

The dispute has turned into a messy partisan fight that's now being waged in federal court. So we'll find out shortly whether the judges can figure out why both sides are wrong.