Tlaib Presses CFPB Director On 'Mindboggling' Medical Debt Statistics

3 months ago

During a House Financial Services Committee hearing prior to the recess, Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) spoke about medical debt.

Fuel your success with Forbes. Gain unlimited access to premium journalism, including breaking news, groundbreaking in-depth reported stories, daily digests and more. Plus, members get a front-row seat at members-only events with leading thinkers and doers, access to premium video that can help you get ahead, an ad-light experience, early access to select products including NFT drops and more:

https://account.forbes.com/membership/?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=display&utm_campaign=growth_non-sub_paid_subscribe_ytdescript

Stay Connected
Forbes on Facebook: http://fb.com/forbes
Forbes Video on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/forbes
Forbes Video on Instagram: http://instagram.com/forbes
More From Forbes: http://forbes.com

Transcript

00:00stop these wild swings in policies, the better off we're going to be and with that, Mr. Chairman,

00:05I yield back. Thank you. The gentleman yields back. The gentleman from Michigan,

00:08Ms. Leib, is now recognized for five minutes. Thank you so much. You enforced the law.

00:12What is it, $183 million you got for our veterans? Yes. I mean, come on, corporations, businesses,

00:17follow the law. That's follow the law and it won't cost you any money. Now, I know you're

00:22not going to be able to say that to my colleague, but it's true. I mean, look at this, 39 public

00:27enforcement actions involved harm to service members and veterans, including six enforcement

00:32actions of violations of the Military Lending Act. My God, corporate greed is on array here in our

00:38country. It is. I mean, it's not like, poof, the money's gone. It's going to our residents.

00:44It's going to our constituents and our families. I mean, I'm just looking at all of this,

00:50which is crazy, the amount of money our banks were just banking off our residents,

00:55that $6.1 billion you were able to literally go after these large, big banks, that some of them

01:01have business plans that over 50 percent, I don't know, maybe that's the credit card companies,

01:05over 50 percent of their business plan was overdrafts and fees. That's what it was. They

01:10were making money off of charging our residents these fees. I mean, it's not like you can take

01:14this money away from them if they applied it under the law, correct? They were violating consumer law.

01:22It's not, you know, that's what you're doing. So if we have a new administration, that's what's

01:25going to happen. Nothing. Do you know how many times I sent various cases, ranking member rotters,

01:30do you know how many cases I sent around service loan folks with student loan issues? Oh, my God,

01:36the loan servicers were out of whack. I mean, give me a break. So I want to talk about bye-bye

01:41medical debt on credit reports. I am so incredibly happy to see that. One of the things that I think

01:48Director, what really was just mind-boggling is hearing my residents talk about the fact that

01:54they would have to, you know, file bankruptcy, all of these things, because it was weighing down

02:00on them being able to access, you know, housing, employment, and so forth. Can you talk as—and

02:07I know this from the study that you all showed. When you did the study, it showed, you know,

02:11the significant impact on our American families across the country to have medical debt on their

02:15credit report. But it was really an inaccurate, you know, picture of someone's risk profile. It

02:21really was. You know, somebody gets sick, and it gets on their credit report. You know, having

02:25that weighed down as if they bought some, like, poor, I don't know, some—I'm not very good at

02:29the car stuff, but something expensive, a luxury item. So, Director, let's talk about that burden

02:35and what this is going to do. How is it going to transform the families around the country?

02:40Well, I think it's going to reduce so much of the harms, especially from inaccurate credit

02:47reporting of medical bills, which really debt collectors are not able to—

02:52You got to explain that, because you're really good at this. Explain that, because people don't

02:56get it. It gets on their credit report, and it was incorrect.

02:59Yes. I think this is the difference. There's so much problems when you park this medical bills

03:05there. It may still be being adjudicated by an insurance company. And on top of that, no one is

03:11seeking out to have medical debt. You know, you borrow money for a car because you want to get

03:18the car to get to work. You borrow money to get a home. You borrow money for an education. You're

03:23not just sort of eager to get medical debt. And I think that this is—there's so many different

03:29facets of this. So we studied carefully the differences, and we have proposed also being

03:36more in line with what Congress wanted was to restrict medical information on people's credit

03:42reports. And I think this is a reasonable intervention to stop a lot of the inaccuracies.

03:48I think one of your colleagues said, well, can't they dispute it? How long will it take to deal

03:53with that, and what will the harm be when you're applying for that loan?

03:57I mean, I think our chairman of our committee was talking about having to dispute it,

04:00because I guess he actually paid his bill, and it still somehow ended up—

04:04So many people pay it just because they want the abuse to stop.

04:10Deirdre, what are some of the coercive practices that debt collectors currently engage in such

04:16as debt parking? Explain that to the American public.

04:19Debt parking is where you put a debt on someone's credit report in the hopes that you can coerce

04:25them into paying to remove— You're too nice. You mean bully them.

04:29Even if you don't even owe it, or you've never even heard of it. And by the way, so much of the

04:34public has also paid one of those debts, even if they didn't owe it.

04:40It's unbelievable. Another concerning practice, of course, is increasing use of medical credit

04:44cards and financing plans. I mean, corporate greed is just coming up with all kinds of various

04:49inventions. Just to be clear, Director, this week's proposed rule doesn't affect debts paid

04:56to medical credit card issuers, does it? Yeah. If you pay a medical expense with a

05:00credit card, any type of credit card, that will be classified separately and is not covered.

05:07I think that's something we should actually look at together, but I really appreciate this. I just

05:11don't want my families—you know, it's not their fault they got sick. They're just seeking help,

05:16and medical debt, again, shouldn't be weighing down our families. Thank you so much. I yield.

05:20The gentleman's time has expired. The gentleman from Texas, Mr. Session, is now recognized.

05:24Chairman, thank you very much. Ms. Troper, you're almost at the end of this

05:29visit that you got with us, and thank you for taking time, not just

05:34informationally to be with us, but I think your attitude, I appreciate very, very much.

Tlaib Presses CFPB Director On 'Mindboggling' Medical Debt Statistics

Category

Transcript

Recommended