The letter, dated April 17, 2026, was addressed to Senator Marcus Riccelli and Representative Joe Timmons regarding proposed bills SB 5480 and HB 1632.
The CFPB commended the state’s efforts to protect consumers from the harms of medical debt reporting, noting that states play a frontline role in enforcing consumer protections.
The bureau emphasized that the preemption of state law under the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act and the Fair Credit Reporting Act is narrow, allowing states to enact laws that reinforce or exceed federal standards.
In 2022, the CFPB issued an interpretive rule stating that state laws prohibiting the furnishing of medical debt information to consumer reporting agencies are generally not preempted.
This position aligns with a January 2025 CFPB regulation that bans the inclusion of medical bills on credit reports used by lenders and prohibits lenders from using medical information in lending decisions.
The bureau noted that this federal regulation has been challenged in lawsuits filed in Texas.
The letter cited court decisions in Maine and Nevada that rejected challenges to state laws restricting medical debt reporting, finding that the FCRA does not categorically preempt such state regulations.
The CFPB argued that medical debt is less predictive of future consumer credit performance than other tradelines and is often rife with unreliable information.
According to the bureau, consumers frequently incur medical bills through unexpected emergencies, with 66 percent of those reporting problems paying medical bills citing one-time or short-term acute medical needs.
The letter highlighted that unpaid medical bills are often subject to opaque pricing and that consumers frequently complain that debts being collected were already paid, do not belong to them, or are otherwise incorrect.
The CFPB concluded that the purpose of the credit reporting system is to assess credit risk, not to coerce people to pay debts they may not owe.