House Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan (R-OH) unleashed a treasure trove of scandalous data against the federal government. Jordan and fellow GOP members have been sifting through allegations of federal agencies spying on Americans.

What he found was evidence that federal officials were targeting U.S. citizens who aligned with popular political positions and pastimes. The depth and breadth of the spying was astounding, and millions of Americans could be documented in a federal file for future reference.

Jordan and his team uncovered federal officials instructed banks to comb through customer data to find terms like “MAGA” or “TRUMP” used in transactions. Every American should be outraged.

From The Daily Wire:
“We now know the federal government flagged terms like ‘MAGA’ and ‘TRUMP,’ to financial institutions if Americans completed transactions using those terms,” Jordan said. “What was also flagged? If you bought a religious text, like a BIBLE, or shopped at Bass Pro Shop.”

This invasion of privacy could affect millions of innocent people who didn’t commit any crimes. Jordan revealed the back-door method federal agencies used to get access to the data.

The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) reportedly asked banks to help in investigations being conducted by federal law enforcement officers. The focus was to help these agents identify transactions of persons of interest using specific typologies and Merchant Category Codes after the events of January 6, 2021.

Federal agents were targeting specific typologies. Jordan said FinCEN supplied banks with documentation on various typologies and suggested the search terms. They were looking for “Lone Actor/Homegrown Violent Extremism Indicators.”

“Extremism indicators” in this widespread surveillance included “bus tickets, rental cars, or plane tickets, for travel to areas with no apparent purpose,” or “the purchase of books (including religious texts) and subscriptions to other media containing extremist views.”

“In other words,” according to Jordan, “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 search didn’t stop with topical searches such as travel tickets and the Bible. Jordan also pointed out that other financial transaction keywords in the federal searches included “Cabela’s” and “Dick’s Sporting Goods.”

This federal trouncing of fundamental civil liberties of average, law-abiding citizens conducting private transactions is alarming. The search requests were conducted in an official capacity and on orders from a federal agency in a massive surveillance sweep against Americans.

“Despite these transactions having no apparent criminal nexus — and, in fact, relate to Americans exercising their Second Amendment rights — FinCEN seems to have adopted a characterization of these Americans as potential threat actors,” according to Jordan.

Key Takeaways:

• Feds’ massive surveillance sweep targeted citizens’ banking transactions.
• Agents asked banks to comb through data for terms like “Maga” or “Trump.”
• Jim Jordan said Feds looked for data that might show “extremism indicators.”

Source: The Daily Wire