Three of the most senior enforcement officials from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau are not done pursuing the financial services industry. They are just doing it from the private sector now.
Eric Halperin, Cara Petersen, and Tara Mikkilineni announced yesterday the launch of Halperin Petersen & Mikkilineni LLP, a public interest law firm that will represent consumers, workers, advocacy organizations, and state attorneys general in litigation against companies the founders say engage in predatory practices. Debt collectors are explicitly in the firm’s crosshairs. The firm’s consumer rights practice will target what it describes as unlawful practices by banks, lenders, debt collectors, and fintechs, including predatory lending, illegal junk fees, and deceptive schemes.
For those in the accounts receivable management industry, the names should be familiar. Halperin served as the CFPB’s Enforcement Director, leading a 250-person division. Petersen, a 14-year veteran of the Bureau who was part of its founding team after the passage of the Dodd-Frank Act, served as Principal Deputy Enforcement Director, overseeing hundreds of investigations and litigations, including cases targeting illegal debt collection. Mikkilineni was Special Counsel to the Enforcement Director, advising leadership on the Bureau’s enforcement docket. Between 2021 and 2025, the team they led secured orders for more than $9.5 billion in penalties and consumer redress.
The firm is a signal of a broader trend that ARM industry executives should be watching closely. As federal enforcement activity has slowed, former regulators are finding new avenues to pursue the same theories they developed in government, this time through private litigation and partnerships with state enforcers. The founders have spent the past year as senior fellows at Protect Borrowers, helping steer that organization’s engagement with state attorneys general, roles they will continue while building the firm. Halperin said in the announcement that federal law enforcement has been dramatically weakened and that litigation is critical to pushing back against corporate abuse.
Two additional attorneys from the CFPB’s enforcement division, Adrienne Warrell and Nicole Mauri, have joined the firm as counsels.
Beyond consumer rights, the firm’s practice areas include tenant rights, with a focus on junk fees and unlawful evictions, workers’ rights, including wage theft and algorithmic wage-setting, and civil rights, including discriminatory lending and the unlawful use of fines and fees.
