The House Financial Services Committee dealt quite a blow to the proposed Consumer Financial Protection Agency today – or at least they may have.

John Campbell, a Republican on the panel from California, submitted an amendment in the CFPA markup session today that would have exempted auto financing from independent car dealers from scrutiny and oversight. The conflicts of interest here are enormous: Campbell is a former car dealer, and his amendment would have lifted from oversight six tenants of his who paid him between $600,000 and $6 million dollars in rent.

The relationship with the auto dealing industry goes even deeper. Rep. Campbell has taken more than $170,000 in campaign contributions from auto dealers during his congressional career, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

“Rep. Campbell ought to pull this amendment which would serve to reward his donors and potentially line his own pockets,” said David Donnelly, National Campaigns Director for Public Campaign. “There is no question that Campbell’s role as landlord to six auto dealerships presents a direct conflict of interest in an amendment that aids auto dealers.”

Americans For Financial Reform had a conference call yesterday detailing horror stories from people who financed their cars with independent dealers and ended up experiencing absolute nightmares. The Consumer Federation of America claims that auto financing is among the top source of complaints from local consumer protection agencies.

Nevertheless, this amendment, clearly a reward to Campbell’s political friends, appeared to pass in the panel today.

Lawmakers on a key committee on Wednesday approved a measure introduced by Rep. John Campbell, R-Calif., a former auto dealer, that would strip a proposed Consumer Financial Protection Agency from the ability to oversee auto financing offered by independent motor vehicle dealers. The financing arms of automotive manufacturing companies, such as GMAC or Toyota Financing, would not be exempted from the oversight.

I say “appeared” because of how the House Financial Services committee has been working these markups. Typically, they have taken voice votes and held the roll calls until later in the evening or first thing in the morning, to ensure that every member of the panel can make the vote. In this case, many members weren’t in the room when the voice vote was taken, and a member did ask for a recorded roll call vote. So far it hasn’t happened, but it’s certainly possible that the final roll call won’t reflect the outcome of the voice vote.

Members of the House Financial Services Committee can be found here. You may want to let them know how you feel about this measure.

UPDATE: The word from the Financial Services Committee is that this roll call vote will happen in the morning. Stay tuned…