Exclusive | Trump regulators vow to end left-wing shakedown of US banks

The nation’s top banking regulators moved Friday to end what senior Republicans called a decades-old “shakedown” scheme that allowed left-wing groups to squeeze billions of dollars from US banks.The plan, exclusively obtained by The Post, comes from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, an independent agency inside the Treasury Department, and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. Together, the two agencies oversee roughly $26 trillion in US banking assets.Comptroller of the Currency Jonathan Gould told The Post that the new joint rules, set to drop Friday, will stop major banks from buying regulatory favor through donations to progressive activist nonprofits.“Banks are going to actually have to do and rely upon their record, actually meeting the credit needs of the local communities in which they operate,” he said in a brief interview.The blueprint targets the Community Reinvestment Act.The 1977 anti-redlining law was designed to ensure banks meet the credit needs of local communities, including low- and moderate-income neighborhoods.Federal regulators currently grade banks on local lending, community investments, and branch networks.

A poor score can block an institution from securing approval for profitable mergers.Critics contend banks have long boosted their ratings by donating to advocacy groups that endorse them to regulators.They claim left-leaning nonprofits use the threat of regulatory protests to strong-arm merging banks into signing massive community benefits agreements.Under the new proposal, banks will no longer earn regulatory credit simply by writing checks to activist organizations, according to the copy of the rules obtained by The Post. Instead, institutions must prove they are directly lending to local families and small businesses.Banks can still make philanthropic gifts.

However, those dollars will no longer count toward federal rating requirements unless the money directly supports local credit needs, the document shows.Se...