"The chairwoman of the House Financial Services Committee and nearly two dozen House Democrats urged a federal bank regulator Wednesday to scrap a potential rule forcing banks to serve oil, gas and firearm companies.

Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) and 22 Democratic members of the Financial Services panel called on the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) to back down from an attempt to prevent banks from spurning industries deemed controversial.

“Instead of implementing the OCC’s statutory mission to ensure all consumers have fair access to financial services, this rulemaking appears designed to force banks to ignore material risks posed by fossil energy companies, gun manufacturers, and other large corporations while providing them access to any banking product or service they want,” they wrote in a Wednesday letter to Acting Comptroller of the Currency Brian Brooks."

Sylvan Lane reports for The Hill December 30, 2020. [2]