NASHVILLE, Tenn.–Rather than calling for elimination of the tax exemption for all credit unions, the independent Community Bankers of America (ICBA) has introduced a new resolution that seeks to end what it called the “unwarranted federal tax subsidies for the nation’s largest credit unions.”
The new policy resolution was announced during the ICBA LIVE 2025 national convention in Nashville, Tenn. It defines “large” as those CUs with $1 billion or more in assets or to “establish tax parity between credit unions and tax-paying community banks.”
There are approximately 450 credit unions in the U.S. above that threshold.
‘Growing Skepticism’
“With credit union acquisitions of tax-paying community banks reaching a record high last year, the growing skepticism of credit unions’ tax and regulatory exemptions must evolve into policymaker action,” ICBA President and CEO Rebeca Romero Rainey said in a statement. “Eliminating the federal tax exemption for credit unions over $1 billion in assets will help ensure taxpayer dollars no longer tilt the competitive marketplace, subsidize community banking consolidation, and result in fewer choices for consumers and small businesses.”
During America’s Credit Unions GAC recently a number of speakers had predicted the banking trade groups would try a “divide and conquer” strategy, although it’s not completely new, as bankers have made similar calls in the past.
The ICBA noted its new policy resolution comes as members of Congress “increasingly scrutinize” credit union acquisitions of community banks. The ICBA further noted the FDIC in 2024 advanced a statement of policy on bank mergers that “for the first time explicitly stated that additional scrutiny may be needed for deals involving credit unions.”
What ICBA Polls Show
Meanwhile, the group said its own consumers recent ICBA polling conducted by Morning Consult found that 62% of U.S. adults say credit unions that operate like banks should have to pay taxes like banks and 62% support a congressional investigation of the credit union industry’s tax and regulatory exemptions.