Leandra English is giving up on her legal battle to become interim director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB).
When Richard Cordray stepped down as director of the CFPB in November, he named English as deputy director, positioning her to take over as acting director upon his departure.
However, shortly after Cordray made his announcement, the Trump Administration announced that it was installing Office of Management and Budget Director Mick Mulvaney as the bureau’s interim director – a move that inflamed House and Senate Democrats.
English promptly sued Trump and Mulvaney, arguing that she should have been named acting director under a provision of the Dodd-Frank Act – which established the CFPB – that allowed Cordray to promote her. A federal judge tossed her request for a restraining order, which, had it been granted, would have blocked the administration’s appointment of Mulvaney to serve as acting director. English then requested a preliminary injunction that would have installed her instead of Mulvaney at the helm of the bureau. That request proved unsuccessful and English took her case to the U.S. Court of Appeals.
However, on Friday English announced that she would drop her lawsuit and leave the bureau, now that Trump has formally nominated Kathy Kraninger to be the agency’s permanent director.
“I want to thank all of the CFPB’s dedicated career civil servants for your important work on behalf of consumers,” English said in a statement posted on Twitter by her lawyer, Deepak Gupta.
Gupta added that English would be filing papers on Monday to “bring the litigation to a close.”
