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By Nupur Anand, Saeed Azhar and Pete Schroeder
NEW YORK (Reuters) -Bank of America and JPMorgan are set to lobby the White House and Congress to defend themselves from accusations by President Donald Trump and others that they have shut down accounts of conservative customers on political grounds.
The banks said they need clearer guidance from the government on how best to police money laundering and provide services across a range of industries. On Thursday, Trump singled out JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America, saying they did not provide banking services to conservatives.
Trump's criticism echoed longstanding "debanking" complaints from Republicans, who have accused Wall Street banks of "woke capitalism," as well as denying services to gunmakers, fossil-fuel companies and others perceived to be aligned with the political right. The two banks on Thursday denied they made banking decisions based on politics.
"We take this issue very seriously," a BofA spokesperson said on Friday. "We will be engaging with the administration and Congress regarding the extensive government regulations that sometimes result in requirements to exit relationships."
The spokesperson said the bank serves more than 70 million clients and welcomes conservatives.
"We never close accounts for political reasons and don’t have a political litmus test," the spokesperson said.
The source familiar with the situation said that JPMorgan would also be lobbying for clearer regulation about assessing customers.
Bank lobby groups will also be part of the effort, according to the source familiar with the situation.
They will push the government to clarify anti-money laundering laws, establish a clear federal standard on fair access to financial services and streamline bank supervisory practices on who can be banked, said the source and two separate sources familiar with the matter.
WHAT BANKS WILL BE ASKING FOR
The Trump administration is expected to prioritize trimming regulations, and banks are hopeful that this could lead to some changes in rules and oversight which will enable them to have clearer standards around debanking, a banking source and two industry sources said.
None of the sources wanted to be identified as these discussion are private.
The U.S in 2020 passed a law overhauling anti-money laundering (AML) rules. However, the overhaul has not happened as planned. Banks are still waiting for clarity on the new rules and will be pushing for new, clearer rules on AML, the banking source and one of the industry sources said.