Capital One Shuttered Over 300 Trump Accounts After Money Laundering Probe

(STRMX/AP photo) (Mark Schiefelbein/AP Photo)

Capital One revealed that it closed hundreds of accounts tied to the Trump Organization following an internal anti-money laundering review, directly challenging claims by President Donald Trump’s family business that it was unlawfully “debanked” for political reasons.

The disclosure came in a court filing on Friday as the bank asked a federal judge in Miami to dismiss a lawsuit brought by the Trump Organization and Eric Trump, who allege the lender severed ties for politically motivated reasons and in the wake of the January 6 Capitol riot. Capital One notified the Trump Organization in March 2021 that it planned to close more than 300 affiliated accounts.

Capital One said the allegations were contradicted by the plaintiffs’ own filings, arguing that “documents and Plaintiffs’ own allegations make clear that Capital One closed Plaintiffs’ accounts for anti-money laundering (“AML”) reasons.”

According to the filing, the decision followed “months of analysis and a careful review by Capital One’s AML team in accordance with bank policies and regulatory guidance.”

The bank stressed it has never accused the Trump Organization of engaging in illegal money laundering, but said the account closures were based on internal compliance procedures.

The filing marks the first time a financial institution has publicly linked the closure of Trump-affiliated accounts to money laundering concerns.

The case has already faced setbacks. A federal judge twice dismissed earlier versions of the complaint while allowing amended filings. Capital One argued that the latest complaint, submitted in July, “suffers from the same fundamental flaws as their prior two pleadings.”

The bank also dismissed allegations that its explanation was merely a pretext, calling the plaintiffs’ claims “misguided” and “based on cherry-picked quotations unsupported by the full context” of documents before the court. It added that “The transaction patterns identified by Capital One are among the types of activity flagged by federal banking guidance.”

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