A JPMorgan Chase source says Obama’s “Operation Choke Point” has nothing to do with its recent account closures
Banks oppose Operation Choke Point, says a JPMorgan Chase source
If this were a Hardy Boys book, it would be The Hardy Boys and the Mystery of the Porn Stars’ Disappearing Bank Accounts.
Last month, porn star Teagan Presley told Vice that JPMorgan Chase & Co. closed her account because the bank considered her “high-risk.” Then, on Wednesday, porn director David Lord told the Daily Beast that Chase sent him a letter notifying him that the bank was going to close his account on May 11. The Beast and Vice suggested that a secretive Justice Department program, “Operation Choke Point,” was behind the account closures. But a Chase insider familiar with the matter says that the initiative has nothing to do with the termination of these accounts.
“This has nothing to do with Operation Choke Point,” the source told Mother Jones. “There’s not a targeted effort to exit consumers’ accounts because of an affiliation with an industry [and] we have no policy that would prohibit a consumer from having a checking account because of an affiliation with this industry. We routinely exit consumers for a variety of reasons. For privacy reasons we can’t get into why.”
The porn stars’ allegations play into a narrative—pushed by banks and congressional Republicans—that the Obama administration is overstretching its authority by forcing banks to police the free market. Here’s the real story:
What is Operation Choke Point? Operation Choke Point is a federal initiative that aims to crack down on fraud by honing in on banks and payment processors—the companies that serve as middlemen between merchants and banks on credit card transactions. Financial institutions are not supposed to do business with companies they believe might be breaking the law. But Justice Department officials suspect that some payment processors ignore signs of fraud—like high percentages of transactions being rejected as unauthorized—in transactions they process, and banks go along for the ride, earning massive profits.
[…] “This has nothing to do with Operation Choke Point,” the source told Mother Jones. “There’s not a targeted effort to exit consumers’ accounts because of an affiliation with an industry [and] we have no policy that would prohibit a consumer from having a checking account because of an affiliation with this industry. We routinely exit …read more […]
How can you tell when a banker is lying? His lips are moving. If the feds have nothing to do with these bank account closures and the banks have no policy mandating them, why are they happening and why have they been happening for the past ten years? Nope, not buying anyone’s alibis here, though I do find it sardonically amusing that Chase would provide cover for the feds. Perhaps it’s out of gratitude for the billions of taxpayer dollars spent bailing out the banks from the consequences of their own larcenous behavior. There is not effective separation between government… Read more »