Major Win: JPMorgan Chase Ends Political Debanking

Working in corporate engagement, I often hear questions about why the ‘long game’ matters in changing woke company policies. If executive orders can instantly push companies away from DEI or ESG initiatives, why take other pathways? The answer is clear: lasting change takes time. JPMorgan Chase, the nation’s largest bank, just proved this with a major policy shift — one that speaks louder than any theory ever could.

In 2022, JPMorgan Chase debanked former U.S. Senator and Ambassador Sam Brownback, after Brownback opened an account for the newly-formed National Committee for Religious Freedom. The son of a Kansas farmer, Brownback refused to back down. When Brownback asked the bank for its rationale in shuttering his account, he was met with conflicting (and incorrect) explanations as to why.

Brownback’s debanking experience was the start of a major wave of scrutiny over exactly what conditions a bank will close a customer’s account. Victims range from nonprofit organizations like Indigenous Advance, an organization serving Ugandan widows & orphans debanked by Bank of America in 2023, to Melania & Barron Trump, who Melania described as having been debanked in her memoir, prompting further inquiry from the House Committee on Oversight.

Yet JPMorgan consistently ranked as one of the major bad actors in the debanking saga, closing not only Brownback’s account (and actually asked for his org’s donor list for restoring service) but several other conservative nonprofits. The biggest bank in America was quickly racking up hits on its record of political neutrality and customer equality.

This trend might have gone unaddressed had the Right simply let the issue lie. Luckily, some of the most influential names in both the conservative legal, financial, and government worlds stepped up to the plate. Pressure for increased transparency and commitments to ditch any policies that could lead to a client being debanked for political reasons has come from all directions, from legal giants like Alliance Defending Freedom to notable financial professionals to state financial officers and attorneys general. As that public pressure mounted, shareholder pressure has been growing from the inside for the past three years, spurred on by organizations like the firm I work for, Bowyer Research, with Chase investors like financial advisor David Bahnsen spending literal years urging the company to clarify its approach to debanking — and fix its spotty track record on political neutrality.

And Chase listened.

In 2023, JPMorgan made the decision to axe its “social risk” policy from its payment processing arm, no longer allowing vague terms like “intolerance” and “hate” to determine whether a customer was fit to continue doing business at Chase. But the biggest win so far came several days ago, when Chase agreed to a policy change explicitly protecting customers and employees from discrimination based on religious or political views.

This is huge. Many stories about companies ditching woke policies consist of the company putting out a public statement (and often the controversy that follows). Statements are great, but they’re not the ideal. Companies can hide behind statements — and do. Several companies that have publicly made statements supporting political neutrality clearly have work to do when it comes to actually putting their policies where their mouths are.

But companies can’t hide behind policy changes. That’s why they’re a sign of both real progress and good faith. Shareholders like Bahnsen, and groups like ADF & Bowyer Research, have been engaging with Chase for years to get this change. Make no mistake: Chase’s willingness to protect against future political/religious debanking is the result of real shareholders using real influence to create real change. It’s a victory for Chase’s customers and shareholders, but also for the company itself. It’s a win for a company to clear up concerns about corporate bias, a win that’s been a long time coming, and a win that hopefully many other banks will find instructive.

* * *

Isaac Willour is an award-winning journalist focusing on race, culture, and American conservatism, as well as a corporate relations analyst at Bowyer Research. His work has been featured at outlets including USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times Opinion, C-SPAN, and The Daily Wire. He is a member of the Young Voices contributor program and can be found on X @IsaacWillour.

The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.