House Passes Financial Choice Act Without Language Repealing Durbin Amendment

Yesterday, the House passed the Financial CHOICE Act along party lines by a vote of 233-186. Fortunately, PMAA and the Merchants Payments Coalition (MPC) were successful in convincing House leadership to drop the language from the Financial CHOICE Act two weeks ago that would have repealed the Durbin Amendment. Repealing the Durbin Amendment would harm petroleum marketers because the Durbin language has brought competition to the debit card fee market.

Last month, nearly 300 PMAA petroleum marketers educated lawmakers on the benefits of debit card fee reform, and in the end, House leadership decided that it was best to strip the Durbin repeal language from the overall bill. PMAA would like to thank everyone who has sent a letter or email, or who has talked with their representatives about the importance of the Durbin language over the past year. In particular, we thank all “Day on the Hill” attendees for their work last month to educate lawmakers on the benefits of debit card fee reform. The visits contributed to this decision to strip the repeal language.