Citizens Bank has long been the key financier behind private prison companies CoreCivic and GEO Group’s meteoric growth. In addition, the bank has publicly minimized reports of mistreatment and abuse at privately-run ICE jails, describing them as “exaggerated.”

A devastating report released last week by the Greater Boston Interfaith Organization (GBIO) directly refutes that. The 20-page report shows “a pattern of systemic failure” at CoreCivic and GEO Group facilities with life-threatening consequences for many of those imprisoned. Although other major Wall Street banks ended their relationships with private prison companies in 2019, Citizens Bank has strengthened its ties, thus enabling and profiting from a brutal mass incarceration campaign.

The ‘Not with Our Money, Citizens’ campaign, a joint effort of GBIO and the De-ICE Citizens Bank Coalition is collecting pledges from member organizations and individuals to move their money out of Citizens Bank if they do not end their practice of financing detention centers.

GBIO has already pulled $3 million of its deposits and vowed to pull more if changes aren’t made. Jersey City, New Jersey’s second largest city, has voted to move $265 million out of the bank.