Alt-right supporters have found their accounts on PayPal, GoFundMe, and Patreon banned or suspended in the last six months. The funding platforms often cite business compliance issues or terms of service violations, but members of the right-wing movement feel it’s infringing on their free speech.
According to BuzzFeed News, PayPal started banning the accounts of several alt-right supporters in early May, including white supremacist site Occidental Dissent and crowd funded investigations site WeSearchr. Malik Obama, the former president’s half-brother, complained his PayPal transactions were suspended because of his alt-right opinions too.
The alt-right is a conglomerate of fringe conservative ideas, so it’s not defined by a single ideology. However, PayPal and other sites like GoFundMe have policies that allow them to not offer their services to individuals that promote hate, violence, or racial intolerance.
Lauren Southern, a right-wing Canadian blogger, was recently involved in a stunt that involved a live-streaming her effort to stop a search and rescue mission for refugees on the Mediterranean sea. She planned to do it again, but on a larger scale until her Patreon account was frozen, according to BuzzFeed News.
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