By Jonathan Stempel
(Reuters) -Citigroup has asked a U.S. judge to dismiss a racial discrimination lawsuit alleging the bank violated federal civil rights law by forgoing ATMs to customers of minority-owned banks.
The third-largest U.S. bank was sued in May by two Florida customers, Werner Jack Becker and Dana Guida, who did not bank with Citi Group and fees were charged for using the ATMs.
Their proposed class action took issue with Citigroup’s policy since 2016 of forgoing out-of-network ATMs for customers of minority-owned banks and credit unions, while charging customers whose banks were owned by people of the “wrong race” were brought.
According to Citigroup’s website, the fee is typically $2.50 per withdrawal.
In a filing late Wednesday in federal court in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, Citigroup said its ATMs do not know the race of users, meaning race did not matter when charging fees.
The New York-based bank added that Becker and Guida are not contractually obligated to use their ATMs and have not shown that their own banks were treated unequally. It said the civil rights law was not a “cure for all racial injustice.”
Attorneys for the plaintiffs did not immediately respond to requests for comment Friday.
The plaintiffs are represented by Consovoy McCarthy, who often advocates conservative causes and in 2023 convinced the U.S. Supreme Court to strike down race-based college admissions programs.
In a statement on Friday, Citigroup called expanding access to banks in underserved communities “core to our mission to enable growth and economic progress,” and said it believed the fee waiver program could overcome all legal challenges to resist.
The bank also disputed that the program has race-based eligibility criteria, saying in Wednesday’s filing that 14 of the 50 participating lenders are not “minority owned.”
The case is Becker et al. v. Citigroup Inc (NYSE:), US District Court, Southern District of Florida, No. 24-60834.
