Within days of his return to the White House, President Donald Trump addressed the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. In typical fashion, Trump didn’t mince words when describing problems with big business and big government pressure.
“I hope you start opening your bank to conservatives because many conservatives complain that the banks are not allowing them to do business within the bank,” Trump said directly to Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan during a virtual address to the conference. “They don’t take conservative business.”
“I don't know if the regulators mandated that because of Biden or what,” Trump continued. “What you’re doing is wrong.”
The comments from Trump come after a slew of bank account closures, including of Indigenous Advance Ministries.
“Indigenous Advance Ministries partners with Ugandan ministries to provide basic necessities for orphaned and vulnerable children, help Christians raise their families, and provide vital vocational skills training and mentorship to college students and young adults,” Alliance Defending Freedom explains. "The ministry set up deposit and credit card accounts with Bank of America in 2015. The bank had no problem with the ministry for years. That is, until April 2023.”
“Indigenous Advance Ministries received unexpected email letters informing them that all their accounts would be closed within 30 days. The bank no longer wanted to partner with the ministry. And they did not explain the reason behind the cancellation. The only information Bank of America said in their letter was, ‘Upon review of your account(s), we have determined you’re operating a business type we have chosen not to service at Bank of America.’ A later letter said, without explanation, that Indigenous Advance ‘no longer aligns with the bank’s risk tolerance,’” ADF continues.
Immediately, the big banks fought back and denied any kind of political litmus test.
“Bank of America serves more than 70 million clients and we welcome conservatives. We would never close accounts for political reasons and don't have a political litmus test,” Bank of America posted on X.
That statement was met with ire and a community note, pointing out that 15 state Attorneys General have warned the bank about discriminatory practices. Victims also responded.
“F U @BankofAmerica! This is a complete lie. You de-banked me, my children, stepchildren and hell you even de-banked my ex-wife and her new husband because their account received child support payments from me. Fix yourself and clear out your illegal discriminatory banking practices,” businessman and Trump supporter Erik Prince posted. “It's time to break up the over-consolidated banking industry and make them actually compete instead of behaving like cartels.”
Debanking is real and “coincidentally” always goes in one political or religious direction. There are hundreds of examples ranging from high-profile debankings to the everyday mom-and-pop shop or Christian charity. The big banks admit it is happening, but dispute the reasons for debanking and claim it has nothing to do with politics.
“We have not debanked anyone because of political or religious relationships, period,” JP Morgan Chase CEO Jaime Dimon said during a recent podcast put out by the bank. “[There are] these examples where they [regulators] put a lot of pressure on us and they tell us what is high risk, and if we don't debank someone and something goes wrong, we can pay hundreds of millions of dollars of fines. So, a lot of banks are guessing like, ‘We should get rid of these people because we don't get rid of them, we'll be fined.’ And you've seen that over and over and over.”
“We're not allowed to tell you why we debanked you,” he continued. “I think we should be allowed to tell you. And I think when we report stuff to the federal government should probably know about it, and there should be far cleaner lines about what we have to do and we don't have to do or things like that. So, we've been complaining about this for years. We need to fix it.”
The evidence and numerous examples of debanking show yet again a corrupt administrative state is using private companies to violate the rights of Americans.
According to congressional investigators, the FBI has repeatedly abused the Bank Secrecy Act in order to work with banks to target Trump supporters and opponents of the Biden administration.
"The information obtained during the Committee and Select Subcommittee’s investigation, and detailed in this report, is concerning. Documents show that federal law enforcement increasingly works hand-in-glove with financial institutions, obtaining virtually unchecked access to private financial data and testing out new methods and new technology to continue the financial surveillance of American citizens," the report states.
"Documents obtained by the Committee and Select Subcommittee demonstrate that federal law enforcement increasingly relies on financial institutions for highly sensitive information about Americans without legal process. Federal law enforcement has effectively deputized financial institutions to advance its investigations and to gain access to the information that financial institutions possess. As financial institutions’ capacity to track and gather data on Americans continues to increase, federal law enforcement will continue to be incentivized to rely on banks for easy access to sensitive information about Americans’ private lives," the report continues.
Dozens of crypto start-ups in Silicon Valley have also been targeted.
"[This has] been happening to all the crypto entrepreneurs in the last four years. This has been happening to a lot of the fintech entrepreneurs, anybody trying to start any kind of new banking service because they’re trying to protect the big banks,” Marc Andreessen said during a recent podcast with Joe Rogan.
So, what’s next? Banks play an important role in detecting and stopping real criminal activity, but the subjective and unclear regulations that leave room for political discrimination must be changed immediately. The banks want it, so do conservatives and entrepreneurs. It’s long past time for a major correction.
