Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., probably isn’t the only senator who is appalled by big banks in America, but he’s one of the first to air his views publicly. Kennedy recently wrote an op-ed for Fox News, in which he takes Citigroup and Bank of America to task for letting personal opinions about the Second Amendment influence business decisions.
“In an act of immense corporate overreach, Citigroup issued a press release in March saying it will penalize banking clients who follow federal, state and local laws regarding gun sales. Citigroup’s new policy tells businesses what kind of firearms and accessories they can stock in their stores, and who they can sell them to.
“Not to be outdone, Bank of America announced that it will no longer loan money to businesses that manufacture semi-automatic rifles.”
Since both banks are private enterprises, some would argue that their business decisions are their own. But, alas, are financial behemoths really “private enterprises”? Well, when you consider that the government in 2008 ruled these two as “systemically important banks” that were “too big to fail,” maybe they’re not as independent as they’d like to proclaim. And if they rely on taxpayer funding—which they did a decade ago—what right does that give them to arbitrarily use their sway to hurt small business?
Kennedy makes that argument in his piece, saying business has no right to try to rewrite the Second Amendment or otherwise make it so difficult to do business that they’re doing essentially the same thing.
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