On January 9th, 2026, President Donald Trump posted on his social media site, Truth Social, in the style of a public service announcement: “Please be informed that we will no longer let the American Public be ‘ripped off’ by Credit Card Companies that are charging Interest Rates of 20 to 30%, and even more.”^[1] After declaring “AFFORDABILITY!,” Trump called for a “one year cap on Credit Card Interest Rates of 10%.”^[2] The replies were universally positive. “Oh yeah. Something that benefits everyone,” one commenter sounded.[3] Another replied, “Credit Card Companies Are Loan Sharks!”^[4] Outside of the Truth Social comments section though, the plan had another supporter: Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders. Sanders echoed Trump: “despite the fact that big banks can borrow money at less than 4% interest from the Federal Reserve, the average interest rate consumers are forced to pay for credit cards is nearly 24%.”^[5] Sanders endorsed Trump’s 10% cap and described legislation that would establish that cap for five years, which he had introduced along with Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO).^[6]

That bill, however, appears to be going nowhere. Speaker of the House Mike Johnson has proclaimed its status as all but dead-on-arrival. He minimized the idea as one that Trump likely had not fully thought through, saying that it was not something to get “spun up about.”^[7] Johnson also raised concerns that the proposal would have negative effects on who would be able to access credit.^[8] This is certainly what the banks think or are saying publicly at least. In response to Trump’s Truth Social post, the American Bankers Association stated that “evidence shows that a 10% interest rate cap would reduce credit availability and be devastating for millions of American families.”^[9] “People will lose access to credit,” Jeremy Barnum, chief financial officer of JP Morgan Chase said in an investor call.^[10] “Especially the people who need it the most, ironically.”^[11]

Although Trump’s proposal might be unlikely to materialize, his public support for the idea is drawing attention to an important and long-standing problem in the United States: access to credit. Credit is a foundational part of economic stability and allows individuals to manage their finances and invest in their futures.^[12] Access to credit allows people to flexibly respond to financial emergencies.^[13] The interest rate cap proposed by Trump and Sanders, assuming it functions as intended, would contribute towards helping those with access to credit cards better manage their credit and existing debt.

However, this is only one part of the problem. Many Americans have little or reduced access to credit to begin with. A national survey by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) in 2023 revealed that 5.6 million households were “unbanked,” meaning that they did not have a bank account and had little or no access to mainstream credit options like a credit card.^[14] These households were also concentrated in the lowest income brackets and disproportionately Black and Hispanic.^[15] The FDIC further found that another 19 million households were “underbanked,” that is, they relied at least in part on nonbank financial services, including money orders and payday loans.^[16] Unbanked and underbanked households have greater difficulty accessing mainstream sources of small-amount credit like credit cards due to bad or non-existent credit histories.^[17] Indeed, only 10% of unbanked households were found by the FDIC to rely in part on a credit card.^[18] Even underbanked households were found to rely on credit cards substantially less than “fully banked” households.^[19] Many of these households rely disproportionately on alternative lenders (like payday loans) which charge substantially higher interest rates and fees.[20] Furthermore, some unbanked households may lack access to even these options.^[21] Although those with little or reduced access to credit make up a fraction of the country, it is with these households that policymakers might be able to do the most good.

But how might this be done? As demonstrated by the swift demise of Trump’s interest rate cap proposal, regulating the banks directly seems to be, in many ways, the path of greatest resistance. Instead, policymakers should consider and take inspiration from Professor Mehrsa Baradaran’s postal banking proposal.^[22] Baradaran, relying in part on a 2014 white paper published by the United States Postal Service Office of the Inspector General (OIG), argues that instead of trying to force banks to provide greater credit options to the unbanked and underbanked population, the federal government should use the Postal Service to fill this role and provide small personal credit options.^[23] While Baradaran readily admits the finer details would need to be worked out in greater detail, she argues that the Postal Service is in a unique position to provide the basis for such a system, as the existing post office network can use economies of scale and existing infrastructure to lower costs.^[24] Furthermore, the OIG estimates that the Postal Service could provide small loans at an interest rate of 28%, substantially lower than interest rates offered by alternative lenders.^[25]

There is also reason to believe that a postal banking-style solution could have legs. To begin with, the plan is less interventionist in the banking industry than the Trump interest rate cap proposal. Rather than forcing banks to offer existing credit products at a lower interest rate, postal banking would focus on filling the gaps where mainstream banks are not offering credit options. To the extent postal banking would end up in conflict with the banks, it would likely be by offering a public credit option to those who might be deciding between a high interest rate credit card and a postal loan, putting pressure on the banks to lower interest rates for this population. Even this pressure is likely to draw a fervent response from the banks (in fact, the banking industry reacted very negatively to the initial OIG report in 2014), however, replacing something like an interest rate cap with postal banking may ultimately form a compromise position between lawmakers and the industry.^[26]

Trump’s recent proposal to cap credit card interest rates, though itself unlikely to end up law, has also exposed hints of a cross-ideological coalition for access to credit legislation. Independent Bernie Sanders and Republican Josh Hawley were the original sponsors of the legislation in the Senate, and Democrat Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Republican Anna Paulina Luna introduced the companion legislation in the House of Representatives.^[27] Although this, on its own, does not say much about deeper support in either chamber, this group of lawmakers does include those on both the left and right wings of American politics.^[28] Rather than partisanship, what actually unites this group of elected officials is that they are all relative newcomers to national politics (with the exception of Sanders). Hawley, Ocasio-Cortez, and Luna were all first elected to Congress years after Baradaran’s initial advocacy for postal banking in 2014 and 2015, and most of them have been described as “anti-establishment” by the political media.^[29] As anti-establishment sentiment in the United States continues to grow and long-time officials are replaced with outsiders, access to credit legislation may find more and more supporters happy to declare big banks and payday lenders alike the enemy.

Finally, changes in Americans’ use of technology may make access to credit legislation even more feasible today than it was in 2015. Since the early- to mid-2010s, unbanked households’ access to smartphones has risen dramatically. The FDIC found that today, 72.1% of these households have access to a smartphone compared to just 35.6% in 2013.^[30] Accordingly, the physical infrastructure and community presence of the Postal Service may not even be necessary to reach and provide credit options to these households.

Ultimately Trump’s proposal to cap credit card interest rates should be the start, not the end, of a national conversation about access to credit. Whether or not postal banking is the best solution to this problem, policymakers should take inspiration from the proposal and, rather than rely on the banks, consider how the federal government itself may be able to provide access to credit.

^[1] Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump), Truth Social, Please be informed that we will no longer let the American Public be “ripped off” by Credit Card Companies that are charging Interest Rates of 20 to 30%, and even more, which festered unimpeded during the Sleepy Joe Biden Administration. AFFORDABILITY! Effective January 20, 2026, I, as President of the United States, am calling for a one year cap on Credit Card Interest Rates of 10%. Coincidentally, the January 20th date will coincide with the one year anniversary of the historic and very successful Trump Administration. Thank you for your attention to this matter. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN! PRESIDENT DONALD J. TRUMP (Jan. 9, 2026, at 08:10 PM ET), https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/115868132990949589 [https://perma.cc/ZU4L-4ECQ].

^[2] Id.

[3] Jbasser (@Jbasser), Truth Social, Oh yeah. something that benefits everyone. Not Bad President Trump, not bad at all. (Jan. 9, 2026, at 09:31 PM ET), https://truthsocial.com/@Jbasser/115868454354077209 [https://perma.cc/9JPQ-WEFG].

^[4] Sheila P (@SheilaPi), Truth Social, Credit Card Companies Are Loan Sharks! (Jan. 10, 2026, at 07:06 AM ET), https://truthsocial.com/@SheilaPi/115870716015329946 [https://perma.cc/WD8W-YR63].

^[5] Bernie Sanders, SEN BERNIE SANDERS: We need to cap credit card interest rates at 10%, Fox News (Feb. 2, 2026), https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/sen-bernie-sanders-need-cap-credit-card-interest-rates-10 [https://perma.cc/ST3Z-HV8N].

^[6] Id.; NEWS: Sanders, Hawley Introduce Bill Capping Credit Card Interest Rates at 10%, Bernie Sanders U.S. Sen. for Vt. (Feb. 4, 2025), https://www.sanders.senate.gov/press-releases/news-sanders-hawley-introduce-bill-capping-credit-card-interest-rates-at-10/ [https://perma.cc/667T-PD58].

^[7] See Sudiksha Kochi, Johnson warns 10 percent credit card interest rate cap could have unintended consequences, The Hill (Jan. 13, 2026), https://thehill.com/homenews/house/5686745-johnson-trump-credit-card-cap-concerns/ [https://perma.cc/C8NN-2JAC].

^[8] See id.

^[9] Banks Respond to Proposed Cap on Credit Card Interest Rates, Am. Bankers Ass’n (Jan. 9, 2026), https://www.aba.com/about-us/press-room/press-releases/rate-caps-statement [https://perma.cc/4U9G-MJDC].

^[10] Megan Cerullo, Trump’s 10% credit card cap deadline is here. Will card companies comply?, CBS News

(Jan. 21, 2026), https://www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-10-percent-credit-card-rate-cap-banks-january-20/ [https://perma.cc/2S3W-HPD4].

^[11] Id.

^[12] See Liz Deichmann, Access to Credit and Financial Services: A Bridge to Financial Well-being, Fed. Reserve Bank of St. Louis (Sept. 25, 2025), https://www.stlouisfed.org/community-development/publications/access-credit-financial-services-bridge-financial-well-being [https://perma.cc/3LP4-N7S4].

^[13] See id.; Why Access to Credit Is Important, Am. Fin. Servs. Ass’n, https://afsaonline.org/2025/07/01/why-access-to-credit-is-important/ [https://perma.cc/HG69-LGZX] (last visited Feb. 28, 2026).

^[14] See Fed. Deposit Ins. Corp., 2023 FDIC National Survey of Unbanked and Underbanked Households 1, 70–71 (2024), https://www.fdic.gov/household-survey/2023-fdic-national-survey-unbanked-and-underbanked-households-report [https://perma.cc/KEC9-MQA2].

^[15] See id. at 22.

^[16] See id. at 65.

^[17] See Off. of the Inspector Gen., U.S. Postal Serv., Providing Non-Bank Financial Services for the Underserved 12 (2014), https://www.oversight.gov/sites/default/files/documents/reports/2017-09/rarc-wp-14-007_0.pdf [https://perma.cc/3VTG-SPH2].

^[18] See Fed. Deposit Ins. Corp., supra note 14, at 71.

^[19] See id.

[20] Id.

^[21] See id. at 65; Off. of the Inspector Gen., supra note 17, at 12.

^[22] See generally Mehrsa Baradaran, How the Other Half Banks: Exclusion, Exploitation, and the Threat to Democracy (2015) [hereinafter Baradaran, How the Other Half Banks]; Mehrsa Baradaran, It’s Time for Postal Banking, 127 Harv. L. Rev. F. 165 (2014).

^[23] See Baradaran, How the Other Half Banks, supra note 22, at 210–11; see generally Off. of the Inspector Gen., supra note 17.

^[24] Baradaran, How the Other Half Banks, supra note 22, at 211, 215.

^[25] Off. of the Inspector Gen., supra note 17, at 13 & n.48.

^[26] Baradaran, How the Other Half Banks, supra note 22, at 220.

^[27] See Bernie Sanders U.S. Sen. for Vt., supra note 6; Ocasio-Cortez, Luna Introduce Bill to Cap Credit Card Interest Rates at 10%, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (Mar. 7, 2025), https://ocasio-cortez.house.gov/media/press-releases/ocasio-cortez-luna-introduce-bill-cap-credit-card-interest-rates-10 [https://perma.cc/7NUW-XGTP].

^[28] See, e.g., Colin Freeman, The Left-wing disruptors aping Trump and Farage, The Telegraph (Nov. 5, 2025), https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/11/03/rise-of-left-wing-disruptors-zohran-mamdani-zack-polanski/ (describing Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez as “hard-Left firebrands”); Matt Sledge, Five GOP Senators Vote to Move Forward Bill Blocking Future Trump Attacks on Venezuela, The Intercept (Jan. 8, 2026), https://theintercept.com/2026/01/08/war-powers-venezuela-gop-senators/ (describing Hawley as “far-right”).

^[29] See, e.g., Alex Isenstadt, Hawley hauls in $3M after attempt to block election results, POLITICO (Apr. 12, 2021), https://www.politico.com/news/2021/04/12/josh-hawley-fundraising-480920 (describing Hawley as “anti-establishment”); Jonathan J. Cooper & Nicholas Riccardi, AOC tries to broaden her appeal within a Democratic base spoiling for a fight, Associated Press (Mar. 23, 2025), https://apnews.com/article/alexandria-ocasio-cortez-bernie-sanders-democrats-trump-cbc249cc4de978acb1333adae5735404 [https://perma.cc/9NMV-UU4D] (describing Ocasio-Cortez as having “anti-establishment roots”); Patrick Healy, Bernie Sanders’s Anti-Establishment Wave, N.Y. Times (Oct. 3, 2015), https://www.nytimes.com/video/us/100000003955972/bernie-sanderss-anti-establishment-wave.html.

^[30] Fed. Deposit Ins. Corp., supra note 14, at 74.