by Jake Pearson, for ProPublica

Last month, when President Donald Trump signed an executive order “guaranteeing fair banking for all Americans,” he served notice of a coming federal crackdown.

Banks who have denied customers access to accounts, loans or credit cards “on the basis of political or religious beliefs or lawful business activities,” he said, would now feel the full force of government regulators. Violators could find themselves facing fines, consent decrees or “other disciplinary measures” in an effort to stamp out “politicized or unlawful debanking.”

The cause hits close to home for the president, whose family business sued Capital One earlier this year, alleging, without providing evidence, that hundreds of its accounts were closed in the summer of 2021 “as a result of pol

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