FIRST ON FOX: Federal law enforcement agencies manipulated the Suspicious Activity Report (SAR) system to gain access to Americans’ financial information without warrant or probable causeThe Judiciary Committee of the House of Representatives said this on Friday.
The panel and its subcommittee on federal government armaments released their interim report, first obtained by Fox News Digital, detailing the findings.
The committee said in the report that the FBI “manipulated” the SAR filing process to treat financial institutions “as de facto branches of law enforcement, issuing ‘requests’ without legal process, which amount to requests for information relating to certain people or activities. it considers it ‘suspicious’.”
“With few exceptions, federal law does not permit law enforcement officials to investigate financial institutions’ customer data without due process of law,” the report said. “The FBI circumvents this process by tipping off financial institutions to ‘suspicious’ individuals and encouraging those institutions to file a SAR – which does not require any legal process – thereby giving federal law enforcement access to confidential and highly sensitive information .”
House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
The committee said the FBI is “circumventing the requirements of the Bank Secrecy Act,” which specifies that it is a bank’s responsibility to file a SAR when it identifies a “suspicious transaction relevant to a potential violation.” of the law or regulation.”
The committee acknowledged that “at least one financial institution had asked the FBI to take legal action for the information it was seeking,” but noted that “too often the FBI appeared to be left unchecked.”
“In short, by providing financial institutions with lists of people it deems ‘suspicious’ on the front end, the FBI has turned this framework on its head and violated the Fourth Amendment’s requirements for particularity and probable cause,” the report said . .
The committee added that its review of “financial surveillance” had “shed new light on the deteriorating state of American financial privacy and the federal government’s widespread, unwarranted surveillance programs.”
The committee began its investigation into government-led financial surveillance earlier this year after a whistleblower revealed that Bank of America “voluntarily and without legal process” provided the FBI with a list of names of all individuals following the events of January 6, 2021 who were using a Bank of America credit or debit card in the Washington, DC area around that time.
Fox News Digital first reported in March that federal investigators had asked banks to search and filter customer transactions by using terms like ‘MAGA’ and ‘Trump’ as part of an investigation into the January 6, 2021 Riot at the Capitol, warned that the purchase of ‘religious texts’ could indicate ‘extremism’.
Rioters loyal to then-President Trump breach the Capitol in Washington DC on January 6, 2021. (AP Photo/John Minchillo, File)
The committee also obtained documents showing that officials suggested banks request transactions using keywords such as Dick’s Sporting Goods, Cabela’s, Bass Pro Shops and more.
A source familiar with the documents told Fox News Digital at the time that while January 6 was the “impetus” for the questions and searches, none of the documents the committee obtained revealed specific time frames or restrictions for banks seeking customer transactions. with the conditions. The source said the federal government used the information for investigations after January 6.
“In the days and weeks following January 6, 2021, the FBI coordinated with the Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network to encourage financial institutions across the country to search their records and file SARs on hundreds of Americans, if not more , without any obvious criminal. nexus,” the report said.
Bank of America told Fox News at the time that it “follows all applicable laws and regulatory requirements to receive, evaluate, process, secure and diligently respond to requests from law enforcement authorities.”
Documents obtained by the committee showed that at least one financial institution had contacted the U.S. Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) with the belief that it would “support the Bureau’s efforts to address the immediate threat of domestic tackle terrorism’.
Rioters loyal to then-President Trump breach the Capitol in Washington DC on January 6, 2021. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana, File)
“The financial institution encouraged FinCEN to use SARs as a basis for filing Patriot Act 314(a) requests, allowing FinCEN to ‘scrutinize the nation’s financial institutions for potential leading information’ from ‘more than 37,000 points of contact at more than 16,000 financial institutions’. institutions to locate accounts and transactions of individuals who may be involved in terrorism or money laundering.”
Following these findings, the panel continued to investigate the matter and obtained more than 48,000 pages of documents, noting that the information they received through their investigation was “concerning.”
“Documents show that federal law enforcement is increasingly working closely with financial institutions, gaining virtually uncontrolled access to private financial data and trying new methods and new technology to continue financial surveillance of American citizens,” the report said.
However, the committee warns that “all Americans should be concerned about how their financial information is collected, made accessible to, and searched by federal and state officials, including law enforcement and regulatory agencies.”
“With the rise of e-commerce and the widespread adoption of cash alternatives such as credit cards or peer-to-peer payment services, the future leaves very little financial activity beyond the purview of modern financial institutions or the prying eyes of government,” it said report. states. “This is because, as a condition of participation in the modern economy, Americans are forced to reveal details about their private lives to a financial industry that has been too eager to pass this information on to federal law enforcement.”
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The report says the committee’s investigation “makes clear that federal law enforcement has taken advantage of this dynamic by using financial institutions as arms of federal law enforcement, directing financial institutions to profile Americans using the typologies that it spreads, or by encouraging financial institutions to identify ‘suspicious’ persons. activity’ that an individual can engage in.”
The committee warns that “without renewed safeguards, the federal government and financial institutions will continue to siphon Americans’ sensitive financial data, place it in the hands of bureaucrats, and erode any remaining semblance of financial privacy in the United States. ”
The FBI did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.
