In March, Citigroup decided to freeze credit to clients who sold firearms to those under the age of 21 and so-called high capacity magazines. First, it’s not unusual for 18-year-olds to own long guns. In my home state of Pennsylvania, scores of 18-year-olds own shotgun and rifles for hunting and target practice. Now, Citigroup can’t track every gun purchase from their customer base, but they’re looking into it. At the time, other banking giants, like Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, and J.P. Morgan Chase, were on the sidelines. Well, now, Bank of America has decided to join the anti-gun push by freezing credit to manufacturers of AR-15 rifles (via Boston Globe):
Bank of America Corp. said Tuesday that it will no longer lend money to companies that manufacture military-style assault weapons for civilian use, in the hopes the move will contribute to a reduction in the number of mass shootings nationwide.
Anne Finucane, Bank of America’s vice chairman, said in an interview on Bloomberg TV that the bank has notified the handful of gun manufacturers it does business with about the decision. It would not name the companies affected by the decision.
“We want to contribute in any way we can to reduce these mass shootings — it’s such a tragedy in the United States,” Finucane said. “We do have a few manufacturers of military-style firearms . . . We have let them know that it’s not our intent to underwrite or finance military-style firearms on a go-forward basis.”
The anti-gun Left can’t ban so-called assault rifles, so they’ll just deprive the makers of these legal firearms of credit. It’s a backdoor ban. They tried to use the legal system to sue the gun industry out of business until Congress passed the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act in 2005. Thank God—since the lawsuits would have shot through the roof, as anti-gun liberals have become more unhinged. Rifles kill fewer than 400 people a year. America is not a shooting gallery because of the AR-15. America is not a shooting gallery period. There is no gun violence epidemic. Mass shootings are still rare. School shootings are even more rare. This is nothing but a naked attempt to shred the Bill of Rights—and it’ll get worse if Democrats do well in the upcoming midterms.