Citizen’s Bank Reacts to NWO$ Campaign Demands

In our Not With Our Money Campaign, GCC has organized under one simple, faith-rooted question: does our money align with our values? On Friday, July 17, Citizens Bank confirmed it is exiting its credit relationships with CoreCivic and The GEO Group, the nation’s two largest private prison and immigrant detention companies—the outcome our congregations have been organizing toward.

This is a positive result, and it belongs to our congregations and members.

Nearly 100 Commitments, One Campaign

The Not With Our Money campaign asked our member congregations to do more than sign a petition — it asked them to look inward, examine where their own deposits were held, and make a commitment to act in line with their values. Nearly 100 people across our congregations answered that call, making individual commitments as part of this campaign: representing more than $1.7 million in personal and congregational deposits. Together, GBIO, GCC and De-Ice Coalition pledged to move over $24 million if Citizens continued financing CoreCivic and GEO Group, demonstrating that our values are reflected not only in our voices, but in how we steward our financial resources.

Building the Pressure, Step by Step

This didn’t happen overnight. Our campaign built steadily alongside our partners at the Greater Boston Interfaith Organization (GBIO) and the broader De-ICE Citizens Bank Coalition:

On June 25, GCC and coalition partners held a press conference at Warrensville Center Rd & Cedar Rd in University Heights, bringing Citizens Bank’s financing of private detention companies into the public conversation. The action drew live media coverage from Ideastream, Cleveland.com, and Cleveland 19, helping carry our message to households across Northeast Ohio.

Congregations organized public actions, direct outreach to Citizens executives, and ongoing newsletters, social media, and press to keep this issue visible.

GBIO and coalition partners pressed the same case in Greater Boston, including an interfaith withdrawal of deposits and direct engagement with Citizens’ CEO.

Each of these steps, on their own, might have seemed small. Together, they built the kind of sustained public pressure that makes the powerful take notice.

What Citizens Bank Said and Why the Result Is What Matters

In its own statement on Friday, July 17, Citizens said it had determined it was “now appropriate to exit the credit facilities” for CoreCivic and GEO Group, pointing to changes in the companies’ capital needs following recent federal purchases of detention facilities.