Ostensibly, the laws are in place to restrict banks from making decisions based on non-financial factors. However, the Treasury is concerned that they could hamper law enforcement and potentially even pose a national security threat.

The law states that allowing banks to consider non-financial factors when doing business would be an  “unsafe and unsound practice.” The letter from the Treasury concludes that laws like this actually “create uncertainty and may inhibit” national security efforts. 

They believe that “woke” practices like considering environmental, social and corporate governance issues in banking could lead to unfair discrimination based on political beliefs and cause damage to legitimate businesses.

Though not mentioned in the letter from the Treasury, Tennessee also recently enacted a similar law. State legislatures in Arizona, Georgia, Iowa, Indiana, Idaho, Louisiana, Kentucky and South Dakota also have measures along the same lines under consideration.

He claims the legislation is necessary to protect the access that conservative groups and industries like the firearms industry have to the financial sector. He argues that this protection is needed as such organizations have, at times, had accounts frozen or closed.

They highlight “the risk that international drug traffickers, transnational organized criminals, terrorists, and corrupt foreign officials will use the U.S. financial system to launder money, evade sanctions, and threaten our national security.”

Rep. Gottheimer expressed his pleasure that the Treaury shares their concerns, saying in a statement: “To any states that are considering similar laws, I urge them to think twice before putting America’s national security at risk.”

Recently, DeSantis massively cut arts and culture grants in the state, vetoing over $32 million in funding for arts projects and organizations in Florida. This drew criticism from prominent figures in Florida’s artistic community.

He slammed the arts cuts as a “horrible message” for the governor to send and labeled it as a detriment to any attempts for Miami to be seen as a “serious city.”

DeSantis stated he was “standing up for taxpayers” with the cuts, protecting the public from “inappropriate use of taxpayer dollars” and shielding people from “sexual festivals.” There is an almost laughable conservatism to this sentiment when one considers that one institution to suffer from the cuts was the highly traditional Miami City Ballet.

Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin is facing backlash for unilaterally using his powers to roll back environmentally conscious legislation aimed to tackle vehicle emissions and withdrawing the state from the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative.

But this isn’t a case of more liberally-minded individuals criticizing a conservative who doesn’t value the arts. This is the U.S. Treasury saying his legislation poses a potential threat to national security. It’s hard to justify that it’s worth protecting conservative business interests at the expense of national security.