The Biden Administration confirmed using conservative-forward terms to search the private bank accounts following the Capitol Hill protests on January 6, 2021.
The Treasury Department admitted that federal investigators closely watched for terms such as "MAGA," "Trump," and "White power" when surveilling the transactions of J6 protestors.
In a letter addressed to Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.), the Treasury Department highlighted "Exchange events" summoned by its Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), "began shortly after J6 under the Trump Administration," and "included terms such as 'antifa,' 'MAGA,' 'Trump,' 'Biden,' 'Kamala,' 'Schumer,' and 'Pelosi.'"
Other terms include "Kamala," "Camp Auschwitz," "Storm, the," "Capitol," "civil war," "kill," "shoot," "gun," "death," "murder," "Biden," "Pelosi," and "Pence."
Per Fox News Digital, the letter comes in response to lawmakers demanding answers to reports federal investigators monitored "politically charged search terms" to flag customer profiles.
"In his letter, Scott wrote that the surveillance "represents a flagrant violation of Americans' privacy and the improper targeting of U.S. citizens for exercising their constitutional rights without due process." Scott previously voted for the Anti-Money Laundering Act of 2020, which codified the FinCEN Exchange program to facilitate the sharing of data between law enforcement and financial institutions to combat crimes like money laundering and the financing of terrorism. Fox News Digital's exclusive report on the surveillance revealed that FinCEN provided materials to financial institutions suggesting they search and filter Americans' financial data using keywords and search terms, as well as merchant category codes to aid law enforcement in identifying persons of interest ahead of the January 20, 2021 inauguration — weeks after the January 6, 2021, Capitol protests. The terms and codes were discovered as part of a House Judiciary Committee and Subcommittee on Weaponization of the Federal Government investigation. The committees obtained documents indicating that MCC codes were used to query transactions like: "3484: Small Arms," "5091: Sporting and Recreational Goods and Supplies," and the keywords "Cabela's," "Dick's Sporting Goods" and "Bass Pro Shops," among others.
The FinCEN also highlighted instances where financial institutions used an "extremism indicator" that could have been employed for "the purchase of books," such as the Bible that contains "extremist views."
Last month, Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) requested testimony from the FinCen former Strategic Operations Division director Noah Bishoff as House Republicans sounded the alarm on “pervasive financial surveillance” that was directed “on the basis of protected political” speech.
“The Committee and Select Subcommittee have obtained documents indicating that following January 6, 2021, FinCEN distributed materials to financial institutions that, among other things, outline the ‘typologies’ of various persons of interest and provide financial institutions with suggested search terms and Merchant Category Codes (MCCs) for identifying transactions on behalf of federal law enforcement,” Jordan wrote in a letter. “In other words, FinCEN urged large financial institutions to comb through the private transactions of their customers for suspicious charges on the basis of protected political and religious expression.”
Jordan ruled that despite the transactions made by Americans who took part in the January 6 protests, they held no criminal offense. Yet, the agency characterized them as potential threats to the country.
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