WATCH: Warnock Forces Vote Prohibiting Predatory Medical Debt Collection Practices, GOP Kills Effort

Last year, the Trump Administration walked back the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's rule to protect consumers by ensuring medical debt collectors must keep their medical debt records valid, accurate, and verifiable-or face legal consequences

The resolution failed 50-50, with all opposition from Senate GOP

Senator Reverend Warnock: "Medical debt leaves Americans in serious financial jams. It wrecks lives"

Washington, D.C. - Today, U.S. Senator Reverend Raphael Warnock (D-GA) forced a vote to revert to a previous policy to restore a rule that prohibits predatory medical debt collection practices, reversing a 2025 Trump Administration decision. Senator Warnock led 29 colleagues in demanding answers from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) on why the Trump Administration was actively working to add medical debt back onto credit reports. Georgia ranks in the top 10 states with the highest rates of medical debt, roughly $855 per Georgian. Over a quarter of rural Georgians have medical collections on their credit report

"Medical debt leaves Americans in serious financial jams. It wrecks lives," said Senator Warnock. "Folks go to the doctor one day for a bandage or some minor injury and end up leaving with a financial burden the size of a mortgage. It could happen to any one of us."

Senator Warnock, a member of the Senate Finance Committee, continues to stand up in defense of Georgia consumers by holding the CFPB under President Trump accountable. Last year, Senator Warnock questioned the Trump administration's CFPB nominees at a Senate Banking Committee Hearing. During the hearing, Senator Warnock asked the nominees if they agreed with President Trump on the CFPB being "A very important thing to get rid of" and if the agency would address the 266,560 outstanding complaints from Georgians in a timely manner.

Watch Senator Warnock's speech HERE.

See below a transcript of Senator Warnock's speech:

"Mr. President,

"I rise today in support of my resolution to restore the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's rule restricting medical debt collections.

"This rule protected Americans from paying for medical services they did not receive or repaying debt they already paid off.

"Medical debt leaves Americans in serious financial jams. It wrecks lives. Folks go to the doctor one day for a bandage or some minor injury, and end up leaving with a financial burden the size of a mortgage. It could happen to any one of us.

"Georgia ranks among the top 10 states with the highest rates of medical debt, to the tune of $855 per Georgian, in large part because of the state's refusal to expand Medicaid. In fact, more than a quarter of rural Georgians, rural Georgians, have medical collections on their credit report, one in four, and that's 10 percentage points higher than the national average. Americans face more barriers as a result.

"Their mortgage costs increase, their access to car loans can be restricted just because they got sick and went into debt for care, and that's why I led 30 of my colleagues in a letter to the Trump administration defending the CFPB work on protecting families from the consequences of medical debt, but the Trump administration's actions will make it easier for debt collectors to aggressively go after sick or struggling Americans and prey on families already saddled with medical debt. That's just cruel and unnecessary.

"I encourage my colleagues to vote yes on this resolution.

"Thank you. I yield back."

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