Biden move helps Americans with unpaid medical bills

US President Joe Biden's outgoing administration has announced a ban on medical debt appearing on consumers' credit reports, making good on a campaign year pledge less than two weeks before leaving office.

Officials said the new regulation, adopted despite objections from the banking and consumer data industries, would remove $49 billion in medical bills from the credit reports of about 15 million Americans.

The announcement from the US Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CPFB) came despite demands from Congressional Republicans that Biden's financial regulators stop issuing new rules as President-elect Donald Trump prepares to take office on January 20, running the risk that Trump or conservative lawmakers may seek to reverse it.

In a statement, Vice President Kamala Harris, who championed the initial policy proposal in June, said the move would be "life-changing for millions of families."

"No one should be denied economic opportunity because they got sick or experienced a medical emergency," Harris said.

According to the Bureau, medical debt provides little indication of whether a borrower is likely to repay a loan and the change should result in an additional 22,000 low-cost mortgages per year and rising credit scores.

The new rule will also prohibit lenders from considering medical information in making lending decisions and help prevent debt collectors from seeking to coerce consumers into paying erroneous medical debts they do not actually owe, the agency said in a statement.

The change was endorsed by the American Medical Association.

Trade groups representing banks and credit bureaus said the evidence did not support the Bureau's decision, and the ban could leave them blind to important information about the risk financial institutions face from borrowers.

The American Bankers Association said that could mean banks offer fewer loans.

Meanwhile Biden has announced the declaration of two new national monuments in California, solidifying his legacy as the US leader who has conserved more lands and waters than any of his predecessors.

The designation of the Chuckwalla National Monument in the southern California desert and the Sattitla Highlands National Monument near the state's northern border comes a day after Biden protected nearly every U.S. coastline from offshore oil and gas development.

Under federal law, presidents have the authority to create or alter national monuments in recognition of a site's cultural, historical or scientific importance, but a designation can be rescinded by a future president.

In 2021, Biden restored the boundaries of three national monuments that had been reduced in size by President-elect Donald Trump during his first term in the White House, following their original designations as monuments by former Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama.