Financial surveillance of U.S. citizens has been carried out by the government partnering with financial companies who use merchant category codes to identify classes of goods and services and report to the government on individuals shopping at certain locations or making certain purchases. Banks named in the committee’s 56-page report include U.S. Bank, Charles Schwab, HSBC, Bank of America, PayPal, KeyBank, Standard Chartered, Western Union, Wells Fargo, Citibank, Santander, JPMorgan Chase, and MUFG. As detailed in the report, the federal government demonstrated “a pattern of financial surveillance aimed at millions of Americans who hold conservative viewpoints or simply exercise their Second Amendment rights. This raises serious concerns and doubts about federal law enforcement’s and financial institutions’ commitment to respecting Americans’ privacy rights and fundamental civil liberties.” Among those surveilled include individuals who expressed opposition to gun control laws, open borders, COVID-19 lockdowns, and vaccine mandates. Federal law enforcement also targeted people for investigation who used keywords like “MAGA” and “TRUMP.” FBI Supervisory Intelligence Analyst George Hill told the committee that Bank of America (BoA) “voluntarily and without legal process, provided the FBI with a list of names of all individuals who used a BoA credit or debit card in the Washington D.C. region between the dates of January 5 and January 7, 2021.” The data dump also included whether a BoA card was ever used to purchase a firearm, “regardless of when or where it was purchased,” according to the report. As explained by Citibank: “Payment brands use merchant category codes (MCCs) to classify merchants and businesses by the type of goods or services provided. Payment brands, issuers and acquirers can use MCCs to categorize, track and restrict transactions. MCCs can be used for tax reporting, interchange promotion and gathering information about cardholder purchasing behavior.” Federal authorities have been using these MCC codes to search through Americans’ transactions to hunt for “extremists.” Government agents have been coming through transactions labeled as “small arms” — a designation for firearms — and at recreational stores, including Bass Pro Shop, Cabela’s, and Dick’s Sporting Goods. “Americans doing nothing other than shopping or exercising their Second Amendment rights were being tracked by financial institutions and federal law enforcement,” the report states. “Never forget: the federal government got this information without any process,” House Judiciary Committee Chair Jim Jordan said during a March 7 hearing on the report. “Big government shouldn’t be working with big banks to target Americans for behavior that is legal and constitutional.”The federal government has been engaging in an extra-constitutional, public-private partnership to illegally build a database of Americans that are flagged as domestic extremists, according to whistleblower testimony to the U.S. House Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government.
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