A landmark federal report shows that America’s largest banks closed accounts belonging to Christians, pro-lifers, and other conservatives during the Biden administration. Officials say they plan to investigate whether the institutions broke any consumer protection laws.
Individuals and organizations rely on banks and other financial institutions every day, and they expect these institutions to serve everyone regardless of their religious convictions or political positions. But over the past five years, congressional testimony and news stories have highlighted how federal officials and financial institutions targeted conservative organizations through debanking. Conservatives deemed “high risk” could have their bank accounts closed without warning and without explanation.
Late last year, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) issued a preliminary report confirming that America’s nine largest banks systematically debanked customers over their political beliefs. On Wednesday, the OCC released a much more comprehensive report, Guaranteeing Fair Banking for All Americans. The report provides examples of real people who were debanked for their political positions and religious convictions.
The report focuses on debanking activity by JPMorgan Chase Bank, Bank of America, Citibank, Wells Fargo Bank, U.S. Bank, Capital One, PNC Bank, TD Bank, and BMO Bank.
In a statement, the OCC said:
“The OCC conducted its supervisory review in accordance with the President’s Executive Order, ‘Guaranteeing Fair Access to Banking for All Americans,’ to determine whether these banks’ policies or practices may have required, encouraged, or otherwise influenced banks to deny or limit access to financial services to Americans because of their political or religious beliefs or lawful business activities. The OCC’s findings show that, between 2020 and September 2025, all nine banks had such policies. …
“In the report, the OCC found that broad reputation risk policies—which lacked clear standards and objective, risk-based criteria—disadvantaged certain Americans based on their political, religious, or social views or based on their lawful business activities. The OCC also found that banks maintained public and nonpublic policies restricting certain industry sectors’ access to financial services, including those in oil and gas exploration, coal mining or coal-powered plants, firearms or ammunition manufacturing or distribution, construction or operation of detention facilities, the manufacturing, distribution or online retail of tobacco or e-cigarettes, and digital asset activities.”
The report reveals that debanking has been widespread:
“JPMorgan’s subsidiary, WePay, Inc. (WePay), terminated accounts for several political or religious leaning merchants. …
“In February 2021, WePay closed the account of a merchant that sold merchandise promoting President Trump and the Make America Great Again (MAGA) brand. WePay determined that the merchant’s merchandise ‘promote[d] hate, violence, or racial intolerance.’ Following the account closure, one employee reported ‘we closed their account due to violating our WePay’s Terms of Services (MAGA and Trump-related items are part of it).’ This employee seems to have been referring to the inclusion of terms like MAGA on the list of search terms discussed above. Although JPMorgan employees did not provide input on the account closure decision, the basis for the decision was explained to bank employees shortly thereafter.
“In June 2021, WePay closed the account of a customer that employees characterized in the bank’s internal tracking system as a ‘[r]ight wing religious conservative non profit with strong anti LGBTQ rhetoric.’ WePay escalated the matter to JPMorgan reputation risk employees. The escalation discussed recent negative media linked to the merchant’s position on hate crime legislation and the Southern Poverty Law Center’s categorization of the organization as an ‘extremist hate group.’ WePay had maintained an account for the merchant since 2019, and there was no evidence to suggest the merchant’s views changed during that time. JPMorgan reputation risk employees advised WePay that ‘from a Reputation Risk perspective, we would recommend an exit from this account.’ In 2023, a reputation risk employee at the bank subsequently removed references in the internal bank tracking system to the nonprofit organization being ‘right wing’ and ‘religious.’ Instead, the employee described the organization as ‘a conservative education and research organization based in [redacted]. Their mission is promoting, protecting, and strengthening traditional family values, which include pro-life, pro-marriage and pro-family.’
“In July 2021, WePay closed an account used to raise funds to support a legal challenge by a ‘devout Christian’ of certain anti-discrimination laws. WePay escalated the matter to JPMorgan reputation risk employees prior to closing the account.”
In a separate statement, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau said it plans to investigate whether any of the banks named in the OCC report broke the law:
“‘It is appalling that these banks targeted American consumers for their political, social, or religious beliefs that did not align with the Biden Administration or its leftist allies. Many of those targeted were supporters of President Trump. These thuggish tactics, which were also a defining feature of the Biden-Chopra CFPB, have no place in America,’ said CFPB’s Acting Director Mark Paoletta. ‘We thank the Department of the Treasury and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency for conducting its review to shed light on these shameful practices. The CFPB will fully investigate whether the institutions featured in OCC’s report and others have complied with federal consumer financial laws and take appropriate action.’
Alliance Defending Freedom Senior Counsel and Senior Vice President of the Counter Censorship Task Force Jeremy Tedesco praised the report, saying:
“No one should be denied access to basic financial services because of their political or religious beliefs. The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency just issued a landmark report, however, revealing how big banks have discriminated against Christians and other mainstream conservatives specifically for their religious and political views. The report detailed how big banks have used vague ‘reputational risk’ standards to punish and cancel accounts of faith-based nonprofits like ADF client Indigenous Advance. As the report made clear, debanking inflicts ‘real-world harm to customers and prospective customers’ like Indigenous Advance, whose Ugandan employees were forced to wait on delayed paychecks because of Bank of America’s decision to abruptly cancel the nonprofit’s accounts.
“This rampant abuse on the part of financial institutions would be alarming enough on its own, but it gets worse. The report also highlights the widespread influence played by far-left groups like the Southern Poverty Law Center, which has recently been indicted on multiple counts, including on three counts of making false statements to a federally insured bank and one count of money laundering.
“ADF has been deeply concerned about the rise of politicized debanking for years and has worked diligently to combat this unlawful behavior at every turn, including partnering with state legislators and federal officials to secure the fundamental freedoms of every American. The OCC’s report underscores how states like Tennessee, Idaho, and South Carolina, which have all enacted laws to protect their citizens against discriminatory debanking, have ‘likely acted as a catalyst for changes in many banks.’ ADF commends the OCC and Trump administration for bringing this threat to light and acting decisively to bring meaningful change, and urges lawmakers in other states, and in Congress, to follow their lead.”
In 2021, Family Council’s credit card processor WePay — a company owned by JPMorgan Chase — terminated our account after designating our organization as “high risk.”
At 10:29 AM on Wednesday, July 7, 2021, our office received a terse email from WePay saying, “Unfortunately, we can no longer support your business. We wish you all the luck in the future, and hope that you find a processor that better fits your payment processing needs.”
Within 60 seconds, Family Council could no longer accept donations online. The processor never explained why we were labeled “high risk.” All we could do is speculate that our conservative principles and our public policy work might have had something to do with the decision to close our account.
Unfortunately, this was not an isolated incident. As the OCC report illustrates, many other organizations had similar experiences.
Family Council is grateful to the many people and organizations who have stood up against debanking in recent years. After all, banks that are too big to fail are also too big to discriminate.
Articles appearing on this website are written with the aid of Family Council’s researchers and writers.
