The specific PEP may have done nothing wrong but their peers have and the bank isn't going to lose money dealing with them.
There's a video online of a speech exposing the number of congresscritters who can't get a credit card because of so many unpaid debts.
Yes, seems to be a political and inbred-family issue. Members of Congress will be our American victims of this. I’ve found overseas you can get better exchange rates on the street and not at the airports. Never had to fill out forms to exchange currency. Has that now changed? I suspect, luke with Farage, there is much more to the story. In Farage’s case, it’s not that he can’t open an account, his account was downgraded because he no longer kept the minimum required for an elite, privileged account. In other words, he is running out of money and is at risk of becoming a debtor.
There’s a G7 international group (Financial Action Task Force) that is increasingly giving a hard time to certain politically-active individuals by designating them “politically exposed persons”. They are the source of the term, and it’s they who can put you on a blacklist that will make banks unwilling to associate with you.
https://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/4165851/posts?page=29#29