Today, the Consumer Federation of America is celebrating the introduction of the Consumer Advocacy and Protection Act of 2026, which would result in more severe financial consequences when companies put Americans at risk with unsafe products. 

Americans, especially our children, deserve safe products. The Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) is the small but important agency tasked with protecting us all from unreasonable risk of injury or death associated with consumer products. One of the tools CPSC can use to protect Americans from unsafe products and bad actors are its civil penalties, which are assessed against parties who violate federal safety law, especially for not reporting known hazards immediately. In recent years, we’ve seen an uptick in CPSC’s pressure on companies through its various enforcement mechanisms, including in the use of civil penalties.  

Some recent examples include:

• An August 4, 2025 settlement with Johnson Health Tech for $16.875 million. Critically, this settlement also set up a compliance-monitoring regime at the company, requiring the business to create a permanent product-safety position responsible for its Consumer Product Safety Act compliance program, annual safety audits, and compliance reports to the CPSC for three years. 
• A June 16, 2026, $8.5 million penalty against Daikin Comfort Technologies Manufacturing, Inc. The settlement also requires the company to set up an Internal Compliance Monitor and implement other compliance reforms. 
• A January 22, 2025 settlement with Fitbit LLC for $12.25 million in response to the company continuing to sell a product despite knowledge that the product was overheating while being worn and causing burns (including second-degree and third-degree burns).  
• A November 8, 2023 settlement with HSN, Inc. in the amount of $16 million for failing to immediately report that approximately 5.4 million Joy Mangano brand “My Little Steamer” and “My Little Steamer Go Mini” products contain a defect that could create a substantial product hazard or unreasonable risk of injury or death. At the time HSN finally filed its first report with the Commission, the company had received approximately 400 complaints, 91 reports of injury, and 29 insurance claims alleging serious injuries.  
• A May 2, 2023 civil penalty for $15.8 million with Generac Power Systems, Inc. to hold the company accountable for years of inaction and delay in the face of a dangerous hazard. By the time the company reported issues to the CPSC, Generac was aware of a total of five customers who suffered grievous bodily injuries, resulting in partial amputations of one or two fingers. Importantly, the settlement also required Generac to take other remedial actions to protect consumers. 

Unfortunately, however, the CPSC’s civil penalty authority is dwarfed by the size of modern corporations and cannot serve as a proper deterrent. Under current law, civil penalties shall not exceed $120,000 for each violation of non-disclosure per Section 15(b) of the Consumer Product Safety Act and may not exceed $17.5 million for a related series of violations. Just think about it: a large multi-billion-dollar corporation can be fined no more than $17.5 million for putting Americans at risk. This is not a deterrent. It is simply the cost of doing business. Meanwhile, Americans pay the price through preventable injuries and deaths. As now Acting Chairman Peter Feldman wrote in November 2021: 

I write to express my concern that the current maximum civil penalty caps, even as adjusted, may leave CPSC with insufficient tools to enforce against large ecommerce platforms, some of which measure their annual revenue in the hundreds of billions of dollars. In an era where CPSC is asserting jurisdiction to keep pace with 21st Century commerce, and consumer safety depends on CPSC’s ability to provide effective enforcement and deterrence, it now may be time to rethink the agency’s maximum civil penalty caps.

To address this safety gap and strengthen CPSC’s tools to hold corporations accountable, Senator Peter Welch led with Senators Richard Blumenthal, Ed Markey, Brian Schatz, and Ben Ray Luján to introduce the Consumer Advocacy and Protection (CAP) Act. The CAP Act will: 

1. Strike the maximum civil penalty cap on a series of violations.  
2. Increase the individual violation cap from $100,000 to $250,000.  
3. Add clarity into statute about the types of offenses CPSC can fine manufacturers for and subject those civil penalties to the same caps as described above.  
4. Adjust the inflation review period from every five years to every year.  
5. This bill would also create a new formula for inflation adjustments and set a time frame and procedures for these adjustments.  

For that reason, the Consumer Federation of America strongly supports this legislation and applauds Senators Peter Welch, Richard Blumenthal, Ed Markey, Brian Schatz, and Ben Ray Luján for their leadership. It is long past time for Congress to equip CPSC with the authority and strong enforcement tools it needs to protect Americans from unsafe products. For additional information, please find a one-page information sheet here.