DOJ's Operation Choke Point Pressures Banks to Drop Legal Businesses
Beginning in 2013, the Obama Justice Department ran 'Operation Choke Point,' secretly pressuring banks and payment processors to terminate accounts of legal businesses in industries the administration considered politically objectionable — including firearms dealers, payday lenders, and tobacco retailers — effectively using financial access as a lever to punish disfavored speech-adjacent commerce.
Launched by the DOJ's Consumer Protection Branch in 2013, Operation Choke Point used subpoenas and informal pressure to persuade banks to exit entire business categories deemed 'high risk' by DOJ officials, without individual findings of wrongdoing by specific merchants. Targeted industries included payday lenders, firearms dealers, ammunition sellers, tobacco retailers, and coin dealers — all engaged in legal commerce. A May 2014 House Oversight Committee staff report, based on internal DOJ emails, concluded the initiative was designed to 'choke out' businesses the administration found objectionable by cutting off their banking access, bypassing legislative or regulatory processes. The FDIC's Inspector General issued a September 2015 audit finding the FDIC had also pressured banks against serving these industries. In 2017 the Trump DOJ officially terminated the program. Multiple gun dealers and payday lenders successfully sued banks, and some cited government pressure as the reason for account closures. Legal scholars characterized the program as an unconstitutional end-run around First and Second Amendment protections through financial coercion.