Trump Ropes Banks Into His Immigration Crackdown With Wild Order

Donald Trump has signed an executive order that will require U.S. banks to take a closer look at their clients’ citizenship details.

The Tuesday order, titled “Restoring Integrity to America’s Financial System,” directs bank regulators and the government agencies to look into the legal status of people applying for credit cards or loans or opening bank accounts.

“My Administration will not tolerate national security and public safety risks caused by illicit cross-border financial activity, nor will it permit risks to our financial system posed by the extension of credit or financial services to the inadmissible and removable alien population,” the order states.

The White House wrote that America’s financial institutions should “be attentive” to the potential credit risks posed by extending loans to undocumented immigrants, specifying that that situation creates a “structural ‘ability to repay’ deficiency that undermines the safety and soundness of the national banking system” in the event that those individuals are deported.

Exactly how much risk these individuals pose is unknown, since banks have never collected information about their customers’ citizenship or immigration status, reported the Associated Press.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is expected to issue a formal advisory on the new regulations within the next 60 days that will specifically describe certain “red flags and typologies” employers are to be suspicious of, such as potential payroll tax evasion, the use of “foreign-identity documents,” the use of an individual taxpayer identification number (a code typically used by undocumented immigrants in place of a Social Security number), or the use of third-party payment processors that the order claimed could be indicative of “off-the-books” wage payments.

Somehow, the order was less severe than bank executives expected. Early reports on the executive order suggested that the White House was weighing whether to make it mandatory for financial institutions to collect their customers’ citizenship data.

Democrats are moving quickly to force congressional votes on President Donald Trump’s ridiculously corrupt slush fund.

After Trump’s $10 billion lawsuit against the IRS resulted in the creation of a $1.8 billion pool of taxpayer money for him to essentially dole out to his allies at a whim, Democrats want to force Republicans to go on the record about whether they support such blatant fraud.

In the House, Representative John Larson has announced what Democrats are literally calling the SLUSH FUND Act, which would tax the fund at 100 percent, returning every dollar back to the government.

“The President should be focused on public service, not personal gain and profit,” Larson wrote in a press release. “Never in our nation’s history has a sitting president sought a settlement against their own government. Hardworking American taxpayers should not have to write blank checks to Trump, his cronies, and violent January 6th insurrectionists who attacked our Capitol.”

Jamie Raskin, a ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee, told The New Republic that he plans to submit another bill to block the slush fund and any future efforts to create similar pools of money.

“We need to put Republicans on the spot as to whether or not they are going to endorse this rank corruption, or whether they are going to stand up for basic constitutional values,” Raskin said, adding that he wants “straightforward legislation to block this outrageous misappropriation.”

Earlier Wednesday, Raskin moved to subpoena acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, and other members of Trump’s Cabinet involved in the creation of the fund.

Raskin said his proposed bill will be backed by the entire Democratic caucus and that Democrats will seek a discharge petition to force a vote on it. Discharge petitions require majority approval from the House, so this plan may not work unless a few Republicans also vote to bring the bill to the floor. The New Republic can think of at least one GOP House member Dems can count on …

Not to be outdone, Senate Democrats are also planning to force votes on the slush fund as a budget bill to fund the Department of Homeland Security hits the floor in the coming days. Republicans are using the reconciliation process to try to approve the budget, which means Democrats can propose slush fund–related amendments that will automatically go to a vote.

For example, Maryland Senator Chris Van Hollen has said he will introduce a provision that prevents money in the fund from going to child sex offenders or those found guilty of assaulting police officers. “It’s time to see where Republicans stand,” he said.

The U.S. government indicted former Cuban President Raúl Castro in federal court Wednesday for his alleged role in shooting down planes belonging to Cuban exiles in 1996.

Castro, 94, and five others were charged in Miami with conspiracy to kill U.S. nationals, four counts of murder, and two counts of destruction of aircraft related to when the Cuban military shot down planes over the Florida Straits on a humanitarian mission to find refugees trying to escape Cuba, killing four people. Castro is accused of giving the order to fire.

The planes belonged to Brothers to the Rescue, a group founded by Cuban exiles that searched for Cubans fleeing the island in rafts. Three of the people killed were U.S. citizens, while one was a U.S. permanent resident.

“For nearly 30 years, the families of four murdered Americans have waited for justice,” acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said in a press conference in Miami Wednesday. “My message today is clear: The United States and President Trump does not and will not forget its citizens.”

The indictment appears to be part of the Trump administration’s growing pressure campaign to force regime change in the country.

“This isn’t a show indictment,” Blanche stressed when announcing the news. “There is a warrant for his arrest. We expect that he will show up here by his own will or by another way”.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio has invoked the U.S.’s January capture of Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro when discussing Cuba, raising the possibility of Castro meeting the same fate. At the time, Rubio said, “If I lived in Havana and I was in the government, I would be concerned, at least a little bit.”

For months, the U.S. has blocked oil shipments from arriving into Cuba, resulting in electricity blackouts across the country and protests in the capital, Havana. Earlier on Wednesday, Rubio posted a video message in Spanish addressed to the Cuban people.

“The reason you are forced to survive without electricity is not due to an oil blockade by America,” Rubio said, instead blaming the Cuban government for plundering “billions of dollars” and preventing electricity, food, and fuel from reaching the Cuban people.

Cuba’s Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs replied in his own post on X, saying, “The reason why the U.S. Secretary of State lies so repeatedly and unscrupulously when referring to Cuba and trying to justify the aggression to which he subjects the Cuban people is not ignorance or incompetence. He knows full well that there is no excuse for such a cruel and ruthless aggression.”

This story has been updated.

The president has turned his aim against the Senate parliamentarian amid his broiling quarrel with the Republican Party.

Donald Trump publicly lashed out against Elizabeth MacDonough Wednesday, writing on Truth Social that the upper chamber’s nonpartisan adviser should be thrown out because she was appointed by a Democrat years ago, and because of her staunch opposition to including bits and pieces of the SAVE Act in budget reconciliation bills—a position she is required to take by virtue of her job.

“Over the years, she has been brutal to Republicans, but not so to the Dumocrats—So why has she not been replaced?” Trump wrote. “There are many fair people who would be qualified for that vital job.

“The Republicans play a very soft game compared to the Dumocrats. It is their single biggest disadvantage in politics. The Dumocrats cheat, lie, and steal, especially when it comes to Votes in Elections, but stick together, whereas the Republicans allow the Elizabeth MacDonoughs of the World to stay in power, and brutalize us,” Trump continued.

MacDonough became the first woman to serve as Senate parliamentarian in 2012, after she was appointed by then–Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Democrat from Nevada. In his post, Trump incorrectly claimed that MacDonough was appointed by former President Barack Obama, although she was hired during his second term.

The Senate parliamentarian’s role is to advise lawmakers on both chambers’ rules and procedures, and to review spending packages for line items that the Senate cannot make good on. She is also required to oppose policy-oriented provisions in reconciliation bills, a regulation known as the “Byrd rule.”

Yet MacDonough earned the ire of the president over the weekend for doing exactly that, when she nixed the last line item in the Republicans’ budget reconciliation bill: a $1 billion allowance for security funding for Trump’s White House ballroom.

She ruled that the funding provision could not be included as it violated budget reconciliation rules in its current form, an outcome that surprised no one on either side of the aisle, reported Fox News.

Trump was so irate about MacDonough’s decision, however, that he reportedly phoned Senate Majority Leader John Thune to fire her. Thune was not responsive to the request.

“We’re going through a process that we go through every time we have a reconciliation bill and the people on both sides are mad at the parliamentarian,” Thune told NOTUS Tuesday, clarifying that he would not consider firing MacDonough. “That’s been true.”

Thune’s spokesperson Ryan Wrasse said in a social media post over the weekend that the party would continue to revise the language of the legislation until it earned MacDonough’s approval. “None of this is abnormal during a Byrd process,” Wrasse wrote Saturday.

Apparently unsatisfied with Thune’s response, Trump has brought his attacks against MacDonough into broad daylight, offering up her continued employment to the court of public opinion.

In the same lengthy Truth Social post, Trump urged Republicans to “kill the filibuster” (something that the party will likely never do) and pass the SAVE Act, the voter restriction bill that was shelved earlier this month.

“If we don’t pass at least one of these two provisions quickly, you will never see another Republican President again,” Trump wrote, going on to suggest that Democrats will henceforth be able to create two additional states out of Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico. He also claimed that Democrats would pack the Supreme Court with as many as 21 justices and eliminate the filibuster anyway.

“Get smart and tough Republicans, or you’ll all be looking for a job much sooner than you thought possible!” Trump concluded.

For all his bellyaching, the cost of Trump’s White House ballroom project has vastly exceeded his initial projections. Last summer, Trump told the American public that the renovation would cost $200 million and be paid for entirely by private donations. In the months since, Trump has tacked on extra construction to the site and doubled its construction expenses to $400 million.

The price tag grew to $1 billion when Republicans offered to ramp up security at the site, offering taxpayer dollars to foot the bill in the wake of another assassination attempt on the president’s life last month.

Police officers who defended the Capitol on January 6, 2021, are suing the Trump administration over its creation of a $1.776 billion slush fund for President Trump’s allies who claim they were unfairly targeted.

The lawsuit, filed by former Capitol Police officer Harry Dunn and current Washington, D.C. Metropolitan Police Officer Daniel Hodges in U.S. District Court, alleges that the fund is illegal and violates the Constitution’s Fourteenth Amendment, which states the government can’t pay debts “incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States.” They note that the fund could be used to pay the rioters, and also fund violent organizations.

“If allowed to begin making payments, the fund will directly finance the violent operations of rioters, paramilitaries, and their supporters who threatened plaintiffs’ lives that day, and continue to do so,” the officers’ lawyers wrote in the legal filing. “Militias like the Proud Boys will use money from the fund to arm and equip themselves. The fund will grant their [past] acts of violence legal imprimatur.”

The plaintiffs are asking for a federal judge to declare the fund unlawful, to block officials from setting it up, and to reverse any payments that have already been made. The lawsuit alleges that creating the fund also broke federal law, as the government can only settle lawsuits after the attorney general declares that such a payment “is in the interest of the United States.”

“The payment of $1.776 billion into the Anti-Weaponization Fund to settle Trump v. IRS was patently not ‘in the interest of the United States,’” the lawsuit states. “Rather, it was a misappropriation of taxpayer funds orchestrated by the President to reward his allies and the rioters who committed violence in his name.”

It will be interesting to see where this lawsuit goes, and whether it reaches the Supreme Court, which may or may not rule in favor of the president. One hopes that it would see the legal problems with a fund that the president can spend on people who break the law in his name.