RALEIGH, N.C. — Black and Hispanic people in two of North Carolina's biggest cities faced racially motivated discrimination when trying to get mortgages, state and federal officials said Monday, and the bank responsible will now pay millions of dollars to stop further legal actions.
President Joe Biden's administration has been investigating allegations of modern day banks still using Redlining, a Jim Crow era policy used to enforce de facto segregation in housing. Kristen Clarke, who leads the Civil Rights Division at the U.S. Department of Justice, said First National Bank will pay $13.5 million to settle allegations of Redlining in Charlotte and Winston-Salem as recently as 2021.
Clarke said her office has already reached similar settlements for discriminatory lending practices in other states around the nation and will continue pushing to stop the practice.
"Redlining is rooted in our nation's sordid history of racial segregation, and it harms communities of color by limiting equal access to credit and shutting off opportunities to build wealth via home ownership," she said told reporters Monday after announcing the settlement.
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