TACO day for bankers

[dalton99a]

https://apnews.com/article/trump-immigration-banking-citizenship-treasury-08eecd2738bb0b454dce1152492bc3e2

Trump orders banks to take a closer look at clients’ citizenship in new immigration enforcement move
By FATIMA HUSSEIN and KEN SWEET
Updated 8:04 PM CDT, May 19, 2026

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump on Tuesday signed an executive order that requires banks to take a closer look at the citizenship of their customers, a new measure in his administration’s push to clamp down on people living in the country illegally.

The order directs bank regulators and government departments to look for signs that people without legal status are opening accounts or obtaining loans or credit cards. However, the order is less aggressive than banks had expected, as earlier reports suggested the White House was drafting an order that would make collecting customers’ citizenship information mandatory.

The White House has been signaling for weeks that it was planning some sort of executive order that would involve how banks handle their undocumented customers. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said last month that “there should be stricter rules” to open bank accounts.

In response, the banking industry had been aggressively lobbying for months to stop the White House from issuing an executive order that would have made collecting customers’ citizenship status mandatory, arguing it would be expensive and require vast amounts of paperwork. Since the order only offers guidance to the banks instead of a mandate, it appears the banks were able to win over the White House.

...