alt Hacker NewsThat quote is not at all what they said, it appears to have been invented out of thin air by PBS.
Capital One said the closures were a result of review "in accordance with bank policies and regulatory guidance". They did not state they were concerned about money laundering.
AML teams at banks are not limited to money laundering investigations, which PBS would've known if they did even the smallest amount of journalism.
In fact, Capital One explicitly stated they have never revealed the reason behind the closure -- mentioned in the same article.
This is significant because according to internal Capital One documents, along with 8 other banks, they explicitly have policies that deny banking access on the basis of lists that target lawful banking for political reasons. [1]
Another reason this report is garbage is that Capital One would've been obligated to file Suspicious Activity Reports if they suspected money laundering, which would've appeared in the FinCEN leaks. The Trump Organization and no Trump-affiliated were found in them. [2] The leaks included DB's SARs, who was a known Trump-affiliated bank.
[1] https://www.occ.gov/news-issuances/news-releases/2026/nr-occ...
Perhaps I should have linked to the Reuters version instead; it was covered widely:
"Capital One has never accused the Trump Organization of illegal money laundering. But Friday's filing argues that "documents and Plaintiffs’ own allegations make clear that Capital One closed Plaintiffs’ accounts for anti-money laundering (“AML”) reasons"
from
https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/capital-one-says-it...
Other points:
* Capital One says anti-money laundering review prompted closure of more than 300 Trump-affiliated accounts
* Trump Organization and Eric Trump sued in March 2025, alleging political debanking
Notice "political debanking" :)