Executive Order 14331, Guaranteeing Fair Banking for All Americans, 90 FR 38925, FR Doc 2025-15341
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Federal Register / Vol. 90, No. 153 / Tuesday, August 12, 2025 / Presidential Documents 38925
Presidential Documents
Executive Order 14331 of August 7, 2025
Guaranteeing Fair Banking for All Americans
By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the
laws of the United States of America, it is hereby ordered:
Section 1. Purpose. Financial institutions have engaged in unacceptable
practices to restrict law-abiding individuals’ and businesses’ access to finan-
cial services on the basis of political or religious beliefs or lawful business
activities. Some financial institutions participated in Government-directed
surveillance programs targeting persons participating in activities and causes
commonly associated with conservatism and the political right following
the events that occurred at or near the United States Capitol on January
6, 2021. The Federal Government suggested that such institutions flag indi-
viduals who made transactions related to companies like ‘‘Cabela’s’’ and
‘‘Bass Pro Shop’’ or who made peer-to-peer payments that involved terms
like ‘‘Trump’’ or ‘‘MAGA,’’ even though there was no specific evidence
tying those individuals to criminal conduct.
Bank regulators have used supervisory scrutiny and other influence over
regulated banks to direct or otherwise encourage politicized or unlawful
debanking activities. ‘‘Operation Chokepoint,’’ for example, was a well-docu-
mented and systemic means by which Federal regulators pushed banks
to minimize their involvement with individuals and companies engaged
in lawful activities and industries disfavored by regulators based on factors
other than individualized, objective, risk-based standards.
As a result, individuals, their businesses, and their families have been sub-
jected to debanking on the basis of their political affiliations, religious beliefs
or lawful business activities, and have suffered frozen payrolls, debt and
crushing interest, and other significant harms to their livelihoods, reputations,
and financial well-being. Such practices are incompatible with a free society
and the principle that the provision of banking services should be based
on material, measurable, and justifiable risks. Such practices, when wielded
to discriminate against customers and businesses in credit transactions due
to their religion, are also unlawful under the Equal Credit Opportunity
Act (15 U.S.C. 1691 et seq.). They further undermine public trust in banking
institutions and their regulators, discriminate against political beliefs and
free expression of those beliefs, and weaponize a politicized regulatory state.
Sec. 2. Policy. It is the policy of the United States that no American should
be denied access to financial services because of their constitutionally or
statutorily protected beliefs, affiliations, or political views, and to ensure
that politicized or unlawful debanking is not used as a tool to inhibit
such beliefs, affiliations, or political views. Banking decisions must instead
be made on the basis of individualized, objective, and risk-based analyses.
Sec. 3. Definitions. (a) The term ‘‘politicized or unlawful debanking’’ refers
to an act by a bank, savings association, credit union, or other financial
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services provider to directly or indirectly adversely restrict access to, or
adversely modify the conditions of, accounts, loans, or other banking prod-
ucts or financial services of any customer or potential customer on the
basis of the customer’s or potential customer’s political or religious beliefs,
or on the basis of the customer’s or potential customer’s lawful business
activities that the financial service provider disagrees with or disfavors for
political reasons.
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38926 Federal Register / Vol. 90, No. 153 / Tuesday, August 12, 2025 / Presidential Documents
(b) The term ‘‘Federal banking regulators’’ refers to the Small Business
Administration (SBA) and the Federal member agencies of the Financial
Stability Oversight Council with supervisory and regulatory authority over
banks, savings associations, or credit unions.
Sec. 4. Removing Reputation Risk and Politicized or Unlawful Debanking.
(a) Within 180 days of the date of this order, each appropriate Federal
banking regulator shall, to the greatest extent permitted by law, remove
the use of reputation risk or equivalent concepts that could result in politi-
cized or unlawful debanking, as well as any other considerations that could
be used to engage in such debanking, from their guidance documents, manu-
als, and other materials (other than existing regulations or other materials
requiring notice-and-comment rulemaking) used to regulate or examine finan-
cial institutions over which they have jurisdiction. The removal of such
concepts shall be made clear by each appropriate Federal banking regulator
through formal guidance to their examiners. The Federal banking regulators
shall also consider rescinding or amending existing regulations, consistent
with applicable law, to eliminate or amend any regulations that could result
in politicized or unlawful debanking and to ensure that any regulated firm’s
or individual’s reputation is considered for regulatory, supervisory, banking,
or enforcement purposes solely to the extent necessary to reach a reasonable
and apolitical risk-based assessment.
(b) The SBA shall, within 60 days of the date of this order, give notice
to all financial institutions with which it guarantees loans under its lending
programs, requiring that each financial institution that is subject to the
SBA’s jurisdiction and supervision:
(i) within 120 days of the date of this order, makes reasonable efforts
to identify and reinstate any previous clients of the institution or any
subsidiaries denied service through a politicized or unlawful debanking
action in violation of a statutory or regulatory requirement under section
7(a) of the Small Business Act (15 U.S.C. 636) or any requirement in
a Standard Operating Procedures Manual or Policy Notice related to a
program or function of the Office of Capital Access, with notice of the
reinstatement sent to the victim;
(ii) within 120 days of the date of this order, identifies all potential
clients denied access to financial services provided by the financial institu-
tion or any subsidiaries through a politicized or unlawful debanking action
in violation of a statutory or regulatory requirement under section 7(a)
of the Small Business Act or any requirement in a Standard Operating
Procedures Manual or Policy Notice related to a program or function
of the Office of Capital Access, and provides notice to each victim advising
of the denied access and the renewed option to engage in such services
previously denied; and
(iii) within 120 days of the date of this order, identifies all potential
clients denied access to payment processing services provided by the
financial institution or any subsidiaries through a politicized or unlawful
debanking action in violation of a statutory or regulatory requirement
under section 7(a) of the Small Business Act or any requirement in a
Standard Operating Procedures Manual or Policy Notice related to a pro-
gram or function of the Office of Capital Access, and provides notice
to each victim advising of the denied access and the renewed option
to engage in such services previously denied.
Sec. 5. Scrutinizing Politicized or Unlawful Debanking. (a) Within 180 days
of the date of this order, the Secretary of the Treasury, in consultation
with the Assistant to the President for Economic Policy, shall develop a
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comprehensive strategy for further measures to combat politicized or unlaw-
ful debanking activities of financial regulators and financial institutions
across the Federal Government, including consideration of legislative or
regulatory options to eliminate such debanking.
(b) Within 120 days of the date of this order, each Federal banking regulator
shall conduct a review to identify financial institutions subject to its jurisdic-
tion that have had any past or current, formal or informal, policies or
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Federal Register / Vol. 90, No. 153 / Tuesday, August 12, 2025 / Presidential Documents 38927
practices that require, encourage, or otherwise influence such financial insti-
tution to engage in politicized or unlawful debanking and to take appropriate
remedial action, to the extent authorized and consistent with applicable
law, including levying fines, issuing consent decrees, or imposing other
disciplinary measures against any financial institution subject to the jurisdic-
tion of such Federal banking regulator that such Federal banking regulator
finds has engaged in politicized or unlawful debanking that violates applica-
ble law (including section 5 of the Federal Trade Commission Act (15
U.S.C. 45), section 1031 of the Consumer Financial Protection Act (12 U.S.C.
5531), and the Equal Credit Opportunity Act).
(c) Within 180 days of the date of this order, the Federal banking regulators
shall review their current supervisory and complaint data to identify any
financial institution that has engaged in unlawful debanking on the basis
of religion and, if such financial institution is unable to obtain compliance
within the meaning of 15 U.S.C. 1691 and 1691e(g), refer such matters
to the Attorney General for an appropriate civil action, as appropriate.
Sec. 6. General Provisions. (a) Nothing in this order shall be construed
to impair or otherwise affect:
(i) the authority granted by law to an executive department or agency,
or the head thereof; or
(ii) the functions of the Director of the Office of Management and Budget
relating to budgetary, administrative, or legislative proposals.
(b) This order shall be implemented consistent with applicable law and
subject to the availability of appropriations.
(c) This order is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit,
substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity by any party
against the United States, its departments, agencies, or entities, its officers,
employees, or agents, or any other person.
(d) The costs for publication of this order shall be borne by the Small
Business Administration.
THE WHITE HOUSE,
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August 7, 2025.
[FR Doc. 2025–15341
Filed 8–11–25; 11:15 am]
Billing code 8026–09–P
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