This article lists federal and state consumer law changes scheduled to go into effect or expire during the period from December 1, 2025, through January 1, 2027. Other consumer law changes will be enacted in 2026 and will go into effect in 2026; this article lists changes whose effective dates have already been scheduled as…
Read More about Digital Library: New Consumer Law Changes Taking Effect in 2026
Appearing in USA Today and KFF Health News on December 19, 2025, Rae Ellen Bichell interviews NCLC Director of Consumer Reporting and Data Advocacy Chi Chi Wu for coverage of how lawmakers in several states are working to expand medical debt protections for patients, even after the Trump administration reversed course and told states they…
Read More about USA Today: States advance medical debt protections as federal support fades
Appearing in MarketWatch on December 17, 2025, Aarthi Swaminathan interviews NCLC Senior Attorney Jeremiah Battle, Jr. for coverage of proposed changes to a rule barring banks from discriminating against certain borrowers that advocates say are ‘alarming,’ and a ‘step backwards.’ “This rule would invite discrimination to persist in the credit market and create barriers to…
Appearing in The New York Times on December 13, 2025, Jill Terreri Ramos interviews NCLC Senior Attorney Andrea Bopp Stark to help answer a reader’s question about an outstanding “zombie mortgage” held by the previous owners of a home, who didn’t disclose it during the sale. Hopefully, hiring your own attorney will help you understand…
Read More about The New York Times: What Is a ‘Zombie Mortgage,’ and How Can You Avoid It?
Airing on NPR’s Planet Money on December 13, 2025, Vito Emanuel talks to NCLC Associate Director and Director of Federal Advocacy Lauren Saunders about how more shoppers are choosing to buy now, pay later this holiday season. Saunders warns it’s easy to borrow too much and lose track of how much you’re paying and when…
Read More about NPR: Should you use buy now, pay later? Experts share 4 tips to know
NCLC advocates resisted rollbacks of federal consumer protections and fought to increase state-level protections.
The National Consumer Law Center advanced consumer justice in many ways in 2025. In addition to direct advocacy on behalf of low-income consumers, we provided training to the consumer law community through in-person conferences, webinars, digital articles and publications, online resources, and in the media. Here’s a look at NCLC in numbers in 2025. Conferences…
Courts Have Unanimously Rejected Claims that Payday Loan Apps Do Not Offer Loans and That Their Fees Are Not Finance Charges WASHINGTON – The advisory opinion issued today by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) that claims that so-called “earned wage access products” offered through certain payday loan apps are not loans, and that the…
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On State Report Cards, Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, New Jersey, Utah, and Wyoming Get Fs; No State Receives an A
Proposed Rule Would Decimate Fair Lending Protections and Make Buying a Car or Home Harder
Predatory lenders use rent-a-bank schemes to evade state usury limits and charge astronomical rates—100%, 500% and even higher—that are illegal in as many as 45 states. In a classic rent-a-bank scheme, a high-cost lender “rents” a state bank chartered in a state without usury limits for banks and then evades other states’ usury caps by…
Read More about Digital Library: Tenth Circuit Limits Rent-a-Bank Schemes
E.O. Ignores that U.S. Constitution Preserves States’ Role as First Responder WASHINGTON – The executive order President Trump issued yesterday aimed at blocking states from addressing artificial intelligence (AI) risks flies in the face of the critical and constitutional role states have in protecting the public, according to advocates at the National Consumer Law Center. It…
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