Headline Roundup • July 15th, 2025
Court Reverses Biden-Era Rule to Erase Medical Debt from Credit Reports
Summary from the AllSides News Team
A federal judge in Texas reversed a rule issued during President Joe Biden's administration that would have eliminated medical debt from credit reports.
The Details: Texas District Judge Sean Jordan, a President Donald Trump appointee, sided with the credit industry and the Trump administration, ruling that the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) exceeded its authority under the Fair Credit Reporting Act when finalizing the rule in January. The rule would have affected 15 million Americans by excluding about $49 billion in medical bills from credit reports and restricting lenders from using certain medical information in their decisions. Several Republicans wrote to the CFPB at the time with concerns that the rule would “weaken the accuracy and completeness of consumer credit reports.”
For Context: About 1 in 12 US adults have unpaid medical bills of at least $250, according to the Peterson Center on Healthcare and KFF. The CFPB anticipated that the new credit reporting rules would have led to the approval of about 22,000 additional mortgages every year and increase Americans' credit scores by an average of 20 points.
How The Media Covered It: The story was covered more on the left and center than the right. CNN (Lean Left bias), Axios (Lean Left), Scripps News (Center), and The Hill (Center) all mentioned that Jordan was appointed by Trump and that the ruling affects 15 million Americans, while The Epoch Times (Lean Right) did not. However, The Epoch Times did quote advocates for the rule, whereas CNN, Axios, and Scripps did not.
Revised by the AllSides staff (of humans) after a first draft from our custom AI. Learn more. Support our mission. Suggest an improvement to this summary.
Featured Coverage of this Story
A federal judge in Texas has struck down a Biden-era rule that would have barred medical debt from appearing on credit reports.
In a July 11 order, District Judge Sean Jordan of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas found that the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) overstepped its authority when it finalized the rule in January, two weeks before President Donald Trump was sworn in for a second term.
Under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, credit reporting agencies are allowed to include medical debt information in...
A federal judge in Texas reversed a Biden-era rule on Friday that permitted medical debt to be wiped from credit reports, according to court documents.
U.S. District Judge Sean Jordan, a 2019 appointee of President Trump, said the rule by the previous administration exceeds the authority of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). The CFPB, an independent agency, finalized the rule in January as former President Biden was set to leave the White House.
CNN
Americans’ unpaid medical bills will remain on their credit reports after a federal judge last week vacated a Biden-era Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) rule that would have removed such debt.
Judge Sean Jordan of the US District Court of Texas’ Eastern District found that the rule exceeded the bureau’s authority under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, agreeing with the arguments of two industry associations, which had filed a lawsuit against the rule that was later joined by the Trump administration.
The court found that “every major substantive provision of the Medical...
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