New federal rule will remove medical debt from credit reports
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(WASHINGTON) — In a major change that could affect millions of Americans’ credit scores, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau on Tuesday finalized a rule to remove medical debt from consumer credit reports.
The rule would erase an estimated $49 billion in unpaid medical bills from the credit reports of roughly 15 million Americans, the CFPB said.
That could help boost those borrowers’ credit scores by an average of 20 points, helping them qualify for mortgages and other loans.
“No one should be denied economic opportunity because they got sick or experienced a medical emergency,” Vice President Kamala Harris said in a statement touting the new rule.
She announced the proposal for the rule last June alongside CFPB Director Rohit Chopra.
“This will be life-changing for millions of families, making it easier for them to be approved for a car loan, a home loan or a small-business loan,” Harris added.
Major credit reporting agencies have already announced voluntary steps to remove medical debt from their reports.
The final rule is set to take effect in March – but that timeline could be delayed by legal challenges.
Debt collection industry groups like the Association of Credit and Collection Professionals have opposed the change, saying it would result in “reduced consequences for not paying your bills, which in turn will reduce access to credit and health care for those that need it most.”
(NEW YORK) — The federal appeals court that last week rejected TikTok’s attempt to overthrow its pending ban denied the company’s request Friday that sought to pause the ruling and the Jan. 19 deadline for a sale.
The company, which has been forced by a federal law to sell to a new owner or be banned in the U.S., requested the emergency pause earlier in the week arguing it would afford the Supreme Court time to determine whether it should review the law.
However, the D.C. Circuit judges said that Congress made a “deliberate choice” to set a 270-day time frame for the sale-or-ban, “subject to one (and only one) extension.”
“The petitioners have not identified any case in which a court, after rejecting a constitutional challenge to an Act of Congress, has enjoined the Act from going into effect while review is sought in the Supreme Court,” the judges wrote in the unsigned order.
TikTok has not immediately commented about the order.
The Justice Department asked the court to reject TikTok’s request for a temporary injunction.
“The Court is familiar with the relevant facts and law and has definitively rejected petitioners’ constitutional claims in a thorough decision that recognizes the critical national-security interests underlying the Act,” the DOJ’s attorneys said.
The Justice Department did not immediately comment on the decision either.
The case would have to go to the Supreme Court if TikTok chooses to appeal, which could delay the Jan. 19 deadline.
President Joe Biden signed the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, which was part of a massive, $95 billion foreign aid package passed by Congress, on April 24.
As part of the act, TikTok, which has over 170 million U.S. users, is forced to sell the company from its current Chinese-based owner ByteDance.
The president and some congressional leaders have argued that the ultimatum against TikTok was necessary because of security concerns about ByteDance and its connections to the Chinese government.
ByteDance rebutted those allegations in its lawsuit, arguing there has been no tangible evidence that the app poses any security risk and filed a lawsuit against the Justice Department in May.
The law has prompted major protests from TikTok’s American users who have defended the app.
President-elect Donald Trump once proposed a TikTok ban when he was in office but has changed his stance and signaled he would reverse the ban once in office. A reversal, however, would require approval from both houses of Congress.
(NEW YORK) — Tech billionaire Elon Musk, who has vowed to dismantle thousands of federal regulations as the co-head of a new Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, says the nation’s financial security depends on it.
The U.S. risks “strangulation by regulation” as it hurtles toward “bankruptcy super fast,” Musk said in a pair of posts on X this month.
Musk’s general concern about the nation’s multi-trillion dollar debt reflects worry among many economists, and his slash-and-burn rhetoric mirrors that of close ally President-elect Donald Trump.
The ambitious cuts championed by Musk, however, could imperil an array of federal protections that safeguard against harm in just about every corner of American life, regulatory experts told ABC News.
Regulations ensure air and water remain free of toxic pollution, workers receive safety gear and overtime pay, drugs undergo rigorous testing and corporations steer clear of ripping off customers.
“Revoking regulations or refusing to endorse them will endanger people’s lives,” Michael Gerrard, a law professor at Columbia University who specializes in environmental regulation, told ABC News. “I’m very worried.”
In response to ABC News’ request for comment, the Trump transition team touted the involvement of Musk and his plans for streamlining U.S. government.
“Elon Musk and President Trump are great friends and brilliant leaders working together to Make America Great Again. Elon Musk is a once in a generation business leader and our federal bureaucracy will certainly benefit from his ideas and efficiency,” Brian Hughes, a transition spokesperson, told ABC News.
DOGE, the commission co-led by Musk and entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, plans to recommend a “vast reduction” of federal regulations, the two leaders said in a joint op-ed in The Wall Street Journal last week.
Such regulatory cuts would diminish the workload of government agencies, allowing for a significant reduction of federal workers and department budgets, the DOGE leaders said. They recommended a mandate that all federal workers come to the office five days a week, which they claimed would trigger a wave of resignations.
“Now is the moment for decisive action,” Musk and Ramaswamy said, but the pair did not identify specific regulations that they would like to cut.
Musk did not immediately respond to ABC News’ request for comment. Neither did Ramaswamy.
The promise of regulatory cuts may prove more compelling as a declaration of war against the status quo than a nitty-gritty elimination of individual rules, experts said. They pointed to significant legal hurdles faced in unwinding government regulations, as well as the lack of direct authority available to DOGE, a non-governmental entity.
Plus, the experts added, many government regulations involve direct protections of importance to a swath of Americans.
Some experts pointed for instance to an air-quality standard put in place by the Biden administration in February. The regulation lowered the amount of particulate matter air pollution — commonly known as soot — allowable in the nation’s air.
The rule would prevent as many as 4,500 premature deaths and 800,000 cases of asthma symptoms, an Environmental Protection Agency study found. Those health benefits could translate into as much as $46 billion in savings by 2032, the agency said.
The Trump administration may seek to undo the rule as part of wider regulatory cuts, Gerrard said. On the campaign trail, Trump vowed to cut environmental regulations in an effort to ease the burden on businesses, but he did not mention this specific rule. Trump rolled back nearly 100 environmental regulations during his first term, including rules governing clean air, a New York Times analysis found.
Darren Riley, co-founder of an air-quality data startup called JustAir, who was diagnosed with asthma six years ago, said air safety should transcend party politics.
“We should take whatever precautions and procedures necessary to protect the air we breathe and the water we drink as a right to life,” Riley told ABC News.
Workplace safety marks another focus of federal regulation that could draw scrutiny from the Trump administration.
In July, the Biden administration formally proposed a heat-safety rule that would require workplaces with elevated heat risks to provide adequate water, rest breaks and control of indoor temperature.
Shae Parker suffered from dizziness and nausea during bouts of heat exhaustion while working this summer at a Speedway gas station in Columbia, South Carolina, she told ABC News. One year prior, record heat in the area caused similar symptoms during Parker’s shifts at Waffle House, but management failed to provide adequate air conditioning, she said.
Parker has traveled to Washington, D.C., to advocate for the heat safety rule, and she worries that the Trump administration may set aside the regulation.
“Trump really needs to set the heat standard, and if he doesn’t, it’s like he doesn’t care about the country,” Parker said. “He needs to take our lives seriously.”
Waffle House did not immediately respond to ABC News’ request for comment. Neither did 7-11, the parent company of Speedway.
Over three decades ending in the early 2020s, nearly 1,000 workers in the U.S. died from excessive heat exposure, amounting to about 34 deaths per year, an EPA study in June found.
The proposed regulation is in the midst of a public comment period as part of the rule-making process. That phase ends in December, leaving little time for finalization and implementation of the measure before Trump takes office. The Trump administration may very well abandon the rule, experts told ABC News.
“Workers will be on their own when it comes to heat,” Debbie Berkowitz, a former official in the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration under then-President Barack Obama, told ABC News.
For his part, Musk previously said DOGE would incorporate feedback from everyday people about which regulations it would recommend cutting. “Anytime the public thinks we are cutting something important or not cutting something wasteful, just let us know!” Musk said in a post on X earlier this month.
Musk has also said that the nation’s worsening debt will force an increased portion of U.S. tax payments to go to interest payments on such borrowing, rather than to government services.
William Buzbee, a professor of administrative law at Georgetown University who focuses on environmental regulation, said the outcome of Musk’s efforts remains highly unclear. But he will likely face legal pushback as well as backlash from people who would be impacted by the potential rollback of a given regulation.
“The bottom line is, yes, the Trump administration is quite clearly planning to go in a deregulatory direction,” Buzbee said. “It won’t be easy.”
TikTok said Sunday it’s “restoring service” after a ban in the United States initially began to take effect earlier in the day.
“In agreement with our service providers, TikTok is in the process of restoring service. We thank President Trump for providing the necessary clarity and assurance to our service providers that they will face no penalties providing TikTok to over 170 million Americans and allowing over 7 million small businesses to thrive,” the company said in a statement. “It’s a strong stand for the First Amendment and against arbitrary censorship. We will work with President Trump on a long-term solution that keeps TikTok in the United States.”
In a pop-up message visible to users upon reopening the app on Sunday, TikTok again credited President-elect Donald Trump for the app’s return.
“Welcome back! Thanks for your patience and support,” the message read. “As a result of President Trump’s efforts, TikTok is back in the U.S.!”
TikTok briefly went dark between late Saturday night and early Sunday.
Last spring, Congress passed a measure with overwhelming bipartisan support granting TikTok a 270-day window to cut its ties with China-based parent company ByteDance or face a ban in the U.S. Instead of initiating a sale, however, TikTok pursued a legal challenge on First Amendment grounds that ended in failure at the Supreme Court on Friday.
The unanimous ruling from the nation’s highest court found merit in national security concerns regarding potential user data collection or content manipulation that the Chinese government might undertake.
The platform became unavailable for some users Saturday evening, with a pop-up message in the app saying, “Sorry, TikTok isn’t available right now.”
“A law banning TikTok has been enacted in the U.S. Unfortunately, this means you can’t use TikTok for now,” the message went on. “We are fortunate that President Trump has indicated that he will work with us on a solution to reinstate TikTok once he takes office. Please stay tuned!”
By Sunday morning, the app was unavailable in stores run by Apple, Google and Samsung.
The Biden administration said earlier this week that it would not enforce the ban on Sunday, leaving implementation of the measure to President-elect Donald Trump, who takes office on Monday. Trump has vowed to reverse the ban.
In a Truth Social post on Sunday morning, Trump said he’s “asking companies not to let TikTok stay dark!” He said he would issue an executive order on Monday, his first day in office, “to extend the period of time before the law’s prohibitions take effect, so that we can make a deal to protect our national security.”
“The order will also confirm that there will be no liability for any company that helped keep TikTok from going dark before my order,” he added.
Trump said he wants “the United States to have a 50% ownership position in a joint venture.” He said this could be a joint venture between the current owners and new owners.
Earlier Sunday, a Biden administration official accused TikTok of trying to “blame” the situation on the Biden administration, saying “they’ve had a year to deal with it and we were clear we wouldn’t implement it on our final day.”
White House officials had stressed for days that if TikTok were to go dark on Sunday, it would not be because of U.S. enforcement — it would be TikTok’s decision, and that the administration is only kicking the issue to Trump because of the timing.
ABC News’ Michelle Stoddart and Selina Wang contributed to this report.
