Wooing the President

But Mr. Mulvaney’s approach is finding favor with the person who may matter the most: the president. Mr. Trump, several administration aides said, is delighted at the idea of Ms. Warren watching an institution she spent years building being undermined from within — and eager to see Mr. Mulvaney continue waging a battle to reduce federal regulations through the Office of Management and Budget.

Mr. Trump was so intent on changing the consumer bureau’s direction that he planned to fire Mr. Cordray as soon as he became president, but he was talked out of it by advisers. They pointed out that under the statute creating the agency, the president can remove the bureau’s director only for “inefficiency, neglect of duty or malfeasance,” and advised that he wait to make a recess appointment.

Mr. Trump did not like waiting. At one point last summer, he instructed the White House operator to call Mr. Cordray so he could fire him but was talked down by John F. Kelly, according to two former administration officials. In late November, Mr. Cordray resigned and installed his deputy, Leandra English, as acting director. That set off a scramble within the White House to shove Ms. English aside.

The White House, seeking to avoid a new confirmation battle, considered sliding the Treasury secretary, Steven Mnuchin, into an interim leadership role. Gary D. Cohn, then the chairman of Mr. Trump’s National Economic Council, lobbied for Mr. Mulvaney, his sometimes golf partner. Mr. Mulvaney leapt at the chance, arguing that he would be aggressive in dismantling the bureau, according to an administration official.

Democrats have questioned Mr. Mulvaney’s relationships with the industry he is supposed to be policing. At a Senate Banking Committee hearing, Senator Sherrod Brown, Democrat of Ohio, asked Mr. Mulvaney if he had ever “rubbed elbows with payday C.E.O.s or their lobbyists and lawyers in exotic locations.”

Mr. Mulvaney, who took about $63,000 from the payday industry while in Congress, said “the only contact” he had “was in the ordinary course of business,” a response that turned out to be untrue.

In February, Mr. Cohn had invited Mr. Mulvaney to a tournament at an exclusive club in the Bahamas. Eating lunch, they were approached by J. Paul Reddam, the founder of CashCall, who told Mr. Mulvaney he wanted to discuss the bureau’s case against the California-based lender over high-cost loans. Mr. Mulvaney responded that he thought all of the payday cases had already been dismissed, but would refer the request to a deputy, according to two people with knowledge of the encounter.