“As we saw with Operation Choke Point, pushing thousands of legal, licensed, and regulated companies out of business by cutting off their access to the U.S. banking system is a gross misuse of government power. It circumvented the legislative and policymaking processes to unfairly punish legitimate organizations.
“The government was right to officially put an end to Operation Choke Point in 2017 and the OCC’s Fair Access rule released today is a step in the right direction to ensure it does not happen again. Banks should not be allowed to discriminate against legal business customers by dropping them due to social or other pressures, period.
“We applaud Acting Comptroller Brooks for taking this action to ensure the integrity of the banking system and protect the millions of Americans who rely on access to short-term, small-dollar credit products to make ends meet.”
