BREAKING: GOP Senate candidate Ted Budd sided with payday lenders as he took their PAC donations

A new report released today reveals that Ted Budd “repeatedly sided with payday lendersand in return they “repeatedly filled his campaign coffers.” Despite North Carolina’s ban on payday loans, Budd has always voted for legislation that supports predatory lenders and their “exploitation tactics.” In May 2017, Budd even received industry donations”a few days after a key votethat would allow payday lenders to charge consumers higher interest rates.

Learn more about Budd’shistory of siding with his donors over his North Carolina voters.”

American Independent: GOP Senate candidate Ted Budd sided with payday lenders as he takes their PAC donations

• North Carolina Republican Senate candidate Ted Budd has always sided predatory lenders and the payday loan industry, even though payday loans are banned in his state. The industry rewarded him with thousands of dollars in campaign contributions.
• He has consistently supported lenders who prey on low-income people using abusive repayment terms and exploitative tactics, practices that have been illegal in North Carolina for more than 20 years.
• In March 2018, Budd signed as co-sponsor of an effort to repeal a Consumer Financial Protection Bureau rule cracking down on paydays, car title and other high-cost loans.
• In July 2020 and again in February 2021Budd introduced a “Freedom to Regulate Act” that would have placed limits on the actions of independent agencies, including the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
• As Budd repeatedly sided with the payday lenders, payday lenders repeatedly filled his campaign coffers.
• He received at least $2,500 of the Community Financial Services Association of America PAC, the political arm of the payday loan industry trade association.
• Funding for Budd’s June 2022 campaign report noted thousands of dollars in PAC contributions from payday loan companies.
• Some of the industry donations he received came days after a key vote.
• On May 4, 2017, Budd vote to advance the Financial Choice Act of 2017 off the House Financial Services Committee. The package, which was primarily aimed at to move back the 2010 Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Actincluded a section determining that the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau “cannot exercise any regulatory, enforcement, or other authority with respect to payday loans, vehicle title loans, or other similar loans.”
• Several financial company executives donated to Budd that month, including at least one payday lender.
• On May 31, he receives $1,000 from Scott Wisniewski, CEO of Western Shamrock Corporation, who offers payday advance loans and has been called “predatory lenderby the advocacy group Texans for Public Justice.

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