Capital One is “responding to demands and requests” related to “fair access to banking,” it told investors Thursday in a quarterly filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
The language mirrors warnings JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America included in their own filings last fall, flagging an August 2025 executive order from President Donald Trump, who directed government agencies to review financial institutions’ policies toward debanking customers.
Trump has personal interest in the matter. He has sued both Capital One and JPMorgan, alleging the latter “unilaterally” closed the accounts of several companies affiliated with him “without warning or remedy” shortly after the Jan. 6, 2021, uprising at the U.S. Capitol.
Months earlier, the Trump Organization sued Capital One, alleging the bank closed some 300 Trump-linked accounts because it believed “the political tide at the moment favored doing so.”
Capital One last May asked a federal judge to dismiss the debanking lawsuit, citing a lack of evidence. The judge granted the motion for dismissal but gave the Trump Organization until July 2 to refile the suit.
Judge Roy Altman, a Trump appointee, called the complaint “deficient,” in a March ruling, but asserted the Trump Organization had done “just enough” to allege the debanking was political but that the suit lacked specifics.
“I’m going to ask you to beef up these general allegations,” Altman told Trump’s lawyer, Alejandro Brito, according to Bloomberg.
Trump’s legal team told the wire service, in a March statement, that the Trump Organization “will follow Judge Altman’s ruling and guidance to engage in fulsome discovery in order to continue to demonstrate that Capital One, along with other major banks, de-banked President Trump, his family, and his businesses for blatantly political reasons.”
Capital One’s lawyer, Helen Cantwell, told Bloomberg she didn’t object to the judge’s plan but expressed disappointment that the plaintiff would be able to conduct discovery after a ruling indicating the Trump Organization had no valid claims.
In its SEC filing Thursday, Capital One referenced the “civil lawsuit filed by the Donald J. Trump Revocable Trust and several affiliated corporate entities … which is pending in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida.”
Political debanking has been a talking point for nearly the entirety of Trump’s second term. During his first week back in office, he confronted Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan about the issue during a virtual appearance at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
“I hope you start opening your bank to conservatives, because many conservatives complain that the banks are not allowing them to do business within the bank, and that included a place called Bank of America,” Trump said to Moynihan. “I don’t know if the regulators mandated that because of [former President Joe] Biden or what, but you and [JPMorgan Chase CEO] Jamie [Dimon] and everybody, I hope you’re going to open your banks to conservatives because what you’re doing is wrong.”
Moynihan maintained his composure in the moment but weeks later said “the real question was about over-regulation, frankly.”
“We bank everybody,” Moynihan said in February 2025, but added Bank of America sometimes has “to close accounts and we can’t tell people why we did it.” That can create confusion, Moynihan said.
