Senior Trump officials have already telegraphed how they want the NSPM-7 to work in practice. JD Vance, Pam Bondi, Kash Patel, Stephen Miller, and others have openly called for a crackdown on funders of groups on Trump’s enemies list.
(Note, I’m not calling them “leftist” or “progressive” groups. This is part of the administration’s strategy to silence John Bolton and James Comey, neither of whom I would call “leftist” or “progressive.” They’re people Trump doesn’t like. That’s who’s on the list. And that list changes with the King’s moods.)
They now have an official National Security hall pass to initiate new police investigations, financial flags, and IRS scrutiny of anyone “affiliated” with “organized political violence,” from funders to employees to supporters.
Not to totally freak you out or anything, but…
There are already 200+ existing FBI-led Joint Terrorism Task Force teams in field offices around the country. They include both federal agents AND local police. The directive officially encourages these teams to open assessments, run informants, and serve subpoenas/search warrants through the Department of Justice.
So investigations of anyone “affiliated” with “anti-American” advocacy can now come from local police requests, not just “FBI,” and they can ask for donor lists, Slack logs, vendor records, etc, as they work to map “networks” encouraging “organized political violence.”
Advocacy that Stephen Miller thinks of as motivating “anti-capitalist,” “anti-American,” or acts “hostile to traditional values” could trigger these inquiries.
The directive also uses language from ”material support” laws which make it a federal crime to provide money, services, training, or tangible support to designated foreign terrorist groups. ”Foreign agent by association” claims from Trump and his proxies suggest climate, immigrant-rights, and student groups may be early test cases for how to frame protest as a foreign terror plot.
Lastly, and most mind-bogglingly, the directive asks banks to be on alert for suspicious “anti-American” financial transactions, which should be reported to the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) in the form of Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs).
Here’s the crazy part: If a bank files a SAR about you or your organization, it is legally prohibited from telling you.
Tipping off a customer that a SAR was filed (or revealing anything that would show a SAR even exists) violates the Bank Secrecy Act and can trigger civil and criminal penalties.
I have no GIF for this. It is a fact beyond GIF. I am GIFless.
I can’t figure out how you ever even find out if you’ve been flagged by your bank for “anti-capitalist” transactions (huh?), but the “indicia” that you’re in the SAR zone would be things like, according to these guys, sudden risk reviews, delayed wires, account holds, or unusual information requests, like a Section 314(a) law-enforcement query.
