The ACA Huddle

Leah Dempsey has a career marked by success as an advocate for the financial services industry, committed to advancing their priorities at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the Federal Communications Commission, other federal agencies, and on Capitol Hill. In her role as Vice President and Senior Counsel for Federal advocacy at ACA International, Dempsey leads efforts to develop and implement ACA’s federal advocacy agenda in Washington, DC. She writes and speaks frequently about the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, Unfair Deceptive Abusive Acts and Practices, and federal rules and legislation impacting the accounts receivable management industry.

In her past work, Dempsey served as Senior Director of Advocacy and Counsel at Credit Union National Association, where she led their Consumer Protection Advocacy Team. Additionally, she was the Policy Director for the Community Financial Services Association, and previously served as Legislative Counsel at ACA International.

Dempsey’s career began at the National Republican Senatorial Committee and her prior work also includes working on the legal team for several Republican campaigns. She currently serves on the Debt Collection Practices and Bankruptcy Subcommittee of the American Bar Association’s Consumer Financial Services Committee. She has been honored as a top contributor in the financial services industry by Women in Housing and Finance in their 40 under 40, and as one of the 20 most powerful women in collections. She is also a member of the Federal Communications Bar Association and the Exchequer Club.

Dempsey holds a Juris Doctor from the University of Baltimore School of Law, and a Bachelors of Arts in Political Science, with a concentration in Journalism from the University of Delaware. Dempsey is a member of the Maryland and District of Columbia bars. She is also engaged in many volunteer activities serving the needs of those in both Baltimore and Washington, DC.

Andy Madden serves as ACA International’s Vice President of Government and State Affairs. He has worked in government affairs at both the state and federal levels for more than 25 years on issues ranging from financial services, healthcare, telecom to workplace safety. Andy grew up in southern Mississippi and graduated from Tulane University in New Orleans.He and his wife live in Alexandria, Virginia with their two children.

Colin Winkler, currently corporate counsel for ACA International—the accounts-receivable management industry’s trade association—has a diverse set of legal and professional expertise. He has worked as a financial crimes consultant with Wells Fargo Bank, where he investigated potential money laundering in the context of the Venezuelan currency crisis in 2019; an attorney-editor with Thomson Reuters’ statutes editorial team, where he led early research on the California Consumer Privacy Act; a paralegal supervisor and business operations manager for CACI International at the U.S. Department of Justice, Tax Division, where he worked hand-in-hand with DOJ attorneys to enforce civil tax liabilities through litigation in federal courts; and a collections and creditors’ rights attorney in solo practice and at a small firm in northern Virginia.