If you’ve frequented these pages over the years, you know that all sorts of companies, many of them financial institutions, have stopped doing business with firearms makers, retailers, and other companies associated with guns. They were urged to adopt that policy by the Obama administration’s Operation Choke Point which threatened banks and other firms that did business with the gun industry, legal cannabis sellers, porn producers, and other disfavored businesses.
One of those companies that cut ties with gun businesses was Intuit. The company that most people know for its Quickbooks small business software also provides credit card processing, payroll and other services. In 2018 Intuit was one of many companies that caved to the pressure of the ObamaBots after the Parkland shooting and severed many of its firearm-related business relationships, particularly those that made or sold guns online.
As we reported at the time, they even shut down the account of Gunsite Academy, crippling its ability to take electronic payments as well as freezing and and reversing tens of thousands of dollars of previously authorized transactions (Intuit eventually agreed to pay Gunsite for the inconvenience and interruption of its business.)
Today comes news that Intuit has decided to reverse its more than five-year-old policy and will once again magnanimously allow gun-related businesses to use its services. From Fox News . . .
The reversal comes in the wake of an oversight investigation launched by staff of [Texas Senator Ted] Cruz on the Commerce Committee into business practices from the software company.
In a letter to Intuit CEO Sasan Goodarzi, exclusively obtained by FOX Business, Cruz described the QuickBooks policy, which was in effect until Aug. 1, 2023, that said businesses engaged in “guns and firearms manufacturing… [are]… ineligible (or may become ineligible)” for QuickBooks’ payroll services.
A similar policy was also apparently in effect for businesses engaged in “mail order, phone, or online… firearms and weapons sales.”
In the letter, Cruz wrote, “My office became aware of these discriminatory policies when Dawson Precision, a Texas company that manufactures small firearm parts, informed my office that Intuit had, without warning, canceled its subscription to QuickBooks payroll services.”
“Dawson Precision only discovered what had happened after it submitted payroll…Intuit later said that it canceled Dawson Precision’s account because, as a firearm manufacturer, it was in violation of Intuit’s acceptable use policy,” Cruz added.
According to the Fox report, Intuit’s hand may have been forced by JP Morgan Chase.
Cruz, however, did not lay blame entirely at the feet of Intuit, instead alleging that one of the company’s banking partners – JPMorgan – had “demanded that Intuit create and enforce bank policies regarding firearm sellers and manufacturers.”
Commerce Committee staff, upon hearing of these revelations from Intuit, then held a briefing with both banks where JPMorgan acknowledged being the source of the services policy.
The other bank involved — which should surprise no one — was the assiduously anti-gun Bank of America. B of A was one of a number of big money center banks that happily went along with the Obama administration’s attempts to squeeze the gun industry.
“Intuit clarified that Bank of America required it to prohibit gun manufacturers from using QuickBooks payroll services…Bank of America, however, denied that it had ever given Intuit any instructions relating to firearm manufacturers or sellers. Intuit insisted that Bank of America did. Regardless of who originated these discriminatory policies against gun manufacturers, Intuit was right to end them” Cruz wrote.
Quite the little pissing contest there. Neither JP Morgan Chase nor B of A wanted to be fingered as the perpetrators, likely because many states have now enacted FIND (firearm industry non-discrimination) laws that disqualify anti-gun financial institutions from underwriting bond issues and collecting the lucrative fees that go along with that business. That means a lot of lost revenue, hitting them where it really hurts.
So while the Biden administration’s war on gun ownership continues to rage on this is a win for the good guys, thanks to the pushback against anti-gun financial discrimination.
The NSSF is certainly pleased . . .
NSSF, The Firearm Industry Trade Association, applauds U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) for directly addressing the ongoing and illegal discrimination of the firearm industry by major banks and payment processors. Fox Business reported on this continued discriminatory practice of major banking institutions and payment processors refusing services because officials in those financial sectors politically disagree with Second Amendment rights.
“Discrimination against firearm manufacturers and retailers is not a new phenomenon but it is long past time this practice is ended,” said Lawrence G. Keane, NSSF Senior Vice President and General Counsel. “Major banks, and the payment processors they support, benefit from taxpayer dollars to insure they stay afloat, including the multi-trillion-dollar bailout they enjoyed at taxpayer expense. The discriminatory practice of denying banking services to a Constitutionally-protected industry with which they politically disagree is an abuse of those taxpayer funds. American taxpayers should not be forced to fund banks that actively work to erase their rights. The Second Amendment is not for sale.”
Sen. Cruz, in his capacity as Ranking Member of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, recently wrote to Intuit, a payment processor, that reversed their discriminatory policies of denying QuickBooks services to firearm manufacturers and retailers. The change came only after Senate inquiries into the discriminatory practices. Intuit claimed the policy was directed to them by JP Morgan Chase and Bank of America, both banks that hold discriminatory policies against the firearm industry and refuse banking services in an effort to starve them of essential financial services.
NSSF supports legislative efforts to halt these discriminatory practices by financial service providers, including the Firearm Industry Nondiscrimination (FIND) Act (S. 428/H.R. 53), introduced by Sen. Steve Daines (R-Mont.) and U.S. Rep. Jack Bergman (R-Mich.). This vital legislation would end the ability of corporate entities to profit from taxpayer-funded federal contracts while discriminating against a Constitutionally-protected industry at the same time.
NSSF also supports the Fair Access to Banking Act (S. 293/H.R. 2743), introduced by Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.) and U.S. Rep. Andy Barr (R-Ky.). These bills would require banks to provide access to services, capital and credit based on the objective risk assessment of individual customers, rather than subjective broad-based decisions affecting whole categories or classes of customers.