Press Release-Kennedy and Coleman Continue to Push for Solution to Somali Banking Regulations

Press Release-Kennedy and Coleman Continue to Push for Solution to Somali Banking Regulations

Washington, D.C.-Congressman Mark Kennedy and Senator Norm Coleman sent a new letter this week to Robert Werner, director of the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FINCEN), as part of their continuing effort to seek options for new Americans, especially Minnesota s large Somali community, who are currently prevented from wiring money to their families overseas. The letter requests a meeting in Washington, D.C. between FINCEN, federal banking agencies and Somali leaders to discuss possible solutions to the current banking regulations.

"Many groups of new Americans depend on banks and money service businesses to provide critical financial support in the form of remittances to loved ones, friends and former communities in their troubled homelands, Kennedy and Coleman wrote. "The Somali community faces an especially pressing need to keep this system open as remittance flows account for nearly one-sixth of the $600 per capita yearly income in Somalia."

In August, Kennedy and Coleman sent a letter to Director Werner asking for an immediate review of comments submitted by the Somali community as part of a comment period on the advanced rulemaking process to replace or fix the problematic April 2005 FINCEN guidance. Additionally, they sent a letter to the chairmen of the House Financial Services Committee, on which Kennedy serves, and the Senate Banking Committee asking them to schedule a field hearing in Minnesota so that Congress can learn firsthand the impact on the ability of the Somali community in the United States to send money to their families back home.

"It is our hope that a meeting with federal banking regulators and the Somali community will help ensure that remittances can continue while at the same protecting vital U.S. national security and law enforcement interests, they continued.

In April 2005, Treasury's FINCEN and the federal banking agencies issued Bank Secrecy Act (BSA) related compliance guidance to the banking community as well as money services businesses (MSBs). The new guidance has led some banks to end or reduce their relationships with MSBs, which in turn has had an adverse impact on the Somali community. MSBs are oftentimes the only legal way for the Somali community in the United States to send money to their families in their long-troubled homeland. The BSA requires banks to meet very rigorous compliance activities designed to uncover terrorist financing, money laundering and other criminal activities.

http://markkennedy.house.gov/cgi-data/press/files/778.shtml