Kathleen Engel is a research professor of law at Suffolk University Law School, and Judith Fox is a clinical professor of law at the University of Notre Dame Law School. Both were members of the Consumer Advisory Board of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau for the past three years. The views expressed are their own.

(CNN) Consumer Financial Protection Bureau acting director Mick Mulvaney has ousted a committed group of experts who volunteered their time and expertise to ensure a fair marketplace for businesses and consumers.

The Consumer Advisory Board (CAB) members who were dismissed served the American people by advising the CFPB as required under the Dodd-Frank Act, which Congress passed following the 2008 financial crisis. We were members of that board.

CAB members are not lobbyists paid to promote special interests. Rather, the members engage in intense meetings to advise the CFPB about a range of issues related to consumer financial products and consumer education.

The current CFPB administration neither respects nor welcomes interactions with the CAB. Since Richard Cordray, the former director, resigned last fall, Mulvaney has canceled our meetings and many of our regularly scheduled phone calls and has never taken the time to meet with us. In contrast, Cordray met with us at length three times yearly.

Mulvaney has completely silenced the voice of consumer advocates at an agency that is supposed to be about consumer protection. Worse yet, he has shifted the bureau's focus from consumer protection to easing the regulatory burden on financial firms. It was just this thinking that caused the last economic crisis. While underregulated markets allow profits for good businesses playing fair, they also provide profits for those seeking to take advantage of people. The CAB helped support businesses that were "doing right" while guarding against those that profit by exploiting consumers.