Americans' medical debt can stay in credit reports, Trump judge rules

https://www.npr.org/2025/07/15/nx-s1-5468438/medical-debt-credit-reports-ruling

Americans' medical debt can stay in credit reports, judge rules. What does that mean?
July 15, 2025 6:12 PM ET
By Alana Wise

A federal judge has ruled that medical debt can remain on Americans' credit reports, cancelling a policy set in place by the Biden administration to help relieve the burden of healthcare expenses weighing on nearly a third of the population.

The ruling — handed down by U.S. District Court of Texas' Eastern District Judge Sean Jordan on Friday — was a major blow to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), which has fought against medical debt as a metric of credit worthiness.

In the waning days of the Biden administration in January, the federal banking and financial services watchdog introduced a rule to disallow medical debts from appearing on American credit reports in effort to keep that information from influencing lenders that consider medical expenses to assess borrowers' merit.

"People who get sick shouldn't have their financial future upended," then-CFPB Director Rohit Chopra said at the time. "The CFPB's final rule will close a special carveout that has allowed debt collectors to abuse the credit reporting system to coerce people into paying medical bills they may not even owe."

Credit scores factor into a person's ability to rent or buy a home, secure a car loan, and other major financial decisions that can determine one's socioeconomic footing.

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