Senate Republicans successfully thwarted an attempt by President Obama’s Democratic allies in the Senate to force an up-or-down vote on the nomination of Richard Cordray as the first director of the controversial Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. “Mr. President, after all the harm caused to consumers by financial regulators, it is time that the majority stop using consumer protection as a political football and start taking actions that actually help consumers,” said Sen. Richard Shelby, R-AL, the ranking member of the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee. “We can take the first step by reforming the bureau to make it accountable to the very consumers it seeks to protect,” he added. “Until that time, however, we cannot, should not and will not move forward on the nomination of a director to lead this massive and unaccountable bureaucracy.”