Hunton & Williams LLP announces Ronald L. Rubin, an enforcement attorney at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, has joined the firm as a partner in Washington. He will be part of the firm’s 30-member bankruptcy and creditors’ rights team.
“With the CFPB expected to bring a wave of enforcement actions on behalf of consumers in the areas of residential mortgages, auto loans, credit cards, payday and title lending, debt collection, and student loans, it is going to be a significant advantage to our clients to have Ron’s agency insights and experience,” said Tyler P. Brown, head of the firm’s bankruptcy, restructuring and creditors’ rights practice group.
As one of the earliest employees in the CFPB’s Supervision, Fair Lending and Enforcement Division, Rubin played an important role in building the new agency’s enforcement capabilities. In addition to creating the standard format for all of the Office of Enforcement’s policies and procedures, he drafted the Enforcement Action Process, which governs how Enforcement collaborates with other components of the Bureau prior to taking steps such as opening investigations, issuing civil investigative demands, and suing suspected law violators; and the NORA (Notice and Opportunity to Respond and Advise) procedures, which provide firms under investigation with an opportunity to present their positions prior to a recommendation of enforcement proceedings against them. Rubin has extensive knowledge of the Dodd-Frank Act and other consumer financial laws overseen by the CFPB.
An increasingly stringent regulatory environment at both the federal and state levels has led to an escalation of legal issues related to consumer lending. Heightened oversight of the issuance of consumer credit by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and the Federal Trade Commission has coincided with a rise in class action litigation related to consumer financial protection statutes. Additionally, state attorneys general are more actively enforcing regulations.
“Ron has credibility and experience that can be immediately demonstrated to financial services clients. His arrival builds on the firm’s already solid foundation in the banking regulatory arena; our wealth of experience litigating consumer protection class actions and mortgage servicing-related matters; and our practice before state attorneys general,” said Jarrett L. Hale, a partner in the practice.
Rubin began his career more than 20 years ago by gaining extensive trial experience as a criminal prosecutor. He then spent seven years investigating and prosecuting securities law violations as senior special counsel at the United States Securities and Exchange Commission, and was a managing director in the Legal and Compliance Department of Bear, Stearns & Co. Immediately prior to joining the CFPB, Rubin served as counsel in the regulatory litigation group at Tannenbaum Helpern Syracuse & Hirschtritt LLP in New York.
