Chief Financial Officer Jimmy Patronis, who is running to succeed former U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz in Florida’s 1st Congressional District, plans to file legislation in Congress to dismantle the U.S. Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) if elected.

Patronis says FinCEN targets and blacklists Americans from accessing financial services based on political views and gun ownership.

FinCEN is a U.S. Treasury bureau tasked with collecting and analyzing information about financial transactions with the goal of combating domestic and international money laundering, terrorist financing and other financial crimes.

But Patronis and other conservatives claim the bureau uses its authority to target supporters of President-elect Donald Trump, gun owners and people of faith to remove their access to various financial services.

Patronis points to a letter sent one year ago by U.S. Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio to former FinCEN staffer Noah Bishoff, accusing the agency of distributing “materials to financial institutions” outlining “typologies” of “various persons of interest,” which the letter said included warning institutions of “‘extremism’ indicators,” including by searching for such terms as “Trump” and “MAGA.” The letter said documents also uncovered evidence that FinCEN warned against transactions for religious texts.

“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,” the letter read.

Patronis echoed those concerns in his announcement that he would seek legislation eliminating FinCEN.

“As CFO, I’ve worked for years to set up laws to protect Floridians from being de-banked or losing access to financial services by banks, credit card companies and app-to-app financial transmitters,” Patronis said in a prepared statement

“While we made a lot of progress, the vast majority of banking and lending institutions are federally regulated, and many times the federal regulators at FinCEN were secretly engaging with these billion-dollar companies on who should lose access to financial services.”

He referred there to efforts taken last year, after Jordan’s letter, that prompted 117 banks in Florida to enter into an agreement pledging not to politically discriminate against banking customers.

“It’s all disgusting,” Patronis added. “Worse than that, when consumers sought answers on why they were being de-banked, they couldn’t get straight answers because investigations and administrative reviews were clouded in secrecy.”

As CFO, Patronis also helped pass a bill that allowed credit unions to participate in state programs to provide more competition against big banks that were adopting more environmental, social and governance (ESG) and diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) policies.

In his latest proposed effort, Patronis also attacked the Corporate Transparency Act (CTA). The legislation requires companies to disclose beneficial ownership information about the company. The legislation was enacted in 2021 as a way to combat tax fraud, money laundering and terrorism financing. But it’s on hold pending litigation challenging it.

Patronis, and other Republican leaders, see the CTA as government overreach and efforts are again underway to overturn it, according to The Wall Street Journal. The CTA was passed as part of FinCEN’s operational purview.

“Under the law, small businesses have to report tons of private information to FinCen,” Patronis said. “While President Trump was smart enough to veto the bill, it was overridden, but the bill is currently hung up in the courts. At best, it’s a bunch of complicated paperwork that American businesses shouldn’t have to complete, and at worst, it’s a Big Brother wanting to know every detail about companies, ever ready to throw them in jail.”

The CTA was tucked into the 2021 National Defense Authorization Act. As Patronis said, Trump vetoed the legislation, and both the House and Senate overrode his veto.

But it’s worth noting that in his veto message, Trump did not reference at any point the CTA as being a reason for his veto. He instead listed several provisions for which he was concerned, including lacking “critical national security measures, being a “gift” to China and Russia, including provisions renaming military installations, limiting military construction funds and contradicting the Trump administration’s foreign policy agenda, specifically on its goal to bring troops home.

Still, Patronis offered an alternative.

“If the FBI, CIA or DHS (Department of Homeland Security) are concerned about crimes — they can do police work and go get a warrant,” he said. “The FinCEN folks, however, operate in the gray by getting in a room and providing ‘guidance’ to credit card companies, app-to-app money transmitters, and banks on who, and what, needs to be reported to the feds. It’s downright Orwellian and I’m excited I’ll have the opportunity to do something about it in Congress.” 

Under legislation Patronis supported in Florida, evidence of discrimination based on political views could result in banks being removed from the state’s Qualified Public Depositories (QPD) program, which allows financial institutions to hold public assets. In extreme cases, those found to have engaged in discrimination could be referred for prosecution.

Patronis is running in a Special Election in CD 1 and is considered a top contender in the heavily red district. He has Trump’s endorsement, as well as support from other high-ranking GOP leaders, including House Speaker Mike Johnson, House Majority Leader Steve Scalise and House Majority Whip Tom Emmer.

The Special Primary Election is Jan. 28, with a Special General Election scheduled for April 1. Whoever wins the GOP Primary is almost sure to win the General, because the district is so heavily Republican.

Located in the Panhandle and anchored by Pensacola, CD 1 is one of the most conservative districts in the state. Gaetz was elected to the seat in 2016, winning more than 69% of the vote. This year, he won with 66% of the vote. More than 53% of the electorate is registered as a Republican, according to the most recent L2 voter data. Only 22% of the district’s voters are registered as Democrats.

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