The bill also stipulates that federal banking regulators cannot discourage, prohibit or penalize financial institutions or their employees for serving legal marijuana businesses.
Perlmutter spent years fighting to get that that hearing on marijuana banking in the House Financial Services Committee. “We’ve been introducing a version of this bill for almost six years, since Colorado by initiative legalized recreational marijuana,” he said.
While it is not known if President Donald Trump will back the bill, White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney co-sponsored the bill when he was in Congress.
Republicans say their support is not an endorsement of marijuana but a realization that banking creates paper trails, improves public safety and maintains “the very pillars of liberty and freedom our country was founded on,” Rep. Warren Davidson (R-Ohio), a member of the conservative House Freedom Caucus, said at the February hearing.
It is unclear if the Republican-controlled Senate will take up the issue or if there is enough political will to push through a stand-alone bill, despite long-standing support from the bank and credit union industries.
And not all Republicans on the committee support the bill. Some believe it is premature to create banking services for an industry the federal government still considers illegal. “As far as I know, the House Financial Services Committee does not have jurisdiction over descheduling a drug,” Rep. Blaine Luetkemeyer (R-Mo.), the ranking Republican on the subcommittee, said at the February hearing.