Tim Scott Letter to PayPal: Financial Institutions Are Not Engineers of Social Policy

WASHINGTON – Today, U.S. Senator Tim Scott (R-S.C.) wrote a letter to PayPal President and CEO Dan Schulman, following the company’s announcement that their policy fining users $2,500 for spreading “misinformation” was published by mistake. In the letter, Sen. Scott urges PayPal to disavow discrimination in the financial services industry and requests more information related to the development and publication of the erroneous policy.

 Sen. Scott wrote, “I was gravely concerned by the recently reported updates to PayPal, Inc.’s Acceptable Use Policy (AUP) that would provide the firm carte blanche authority to levy financial penalties against users it determines have violated poorly-defined anti-“misinformation” policies. …

 “Financial institutions provide financial services; they are not engineers of social policy. They should not punish legal industries like firearms dealers or media companies because they disagree politically, nor should they promote credit to politically favored industries. Increasingly, companies seek to benefit from US regulatory backstops and stability, while blatantly ignoring or subverting long-standing US protections for free speech and political diversity. Going forward, I strongly urge PayPal to clarify how it will make its business decisions based on consistent, quantifiable risk-based analysis of customers, rather than internal policy decisions about what legal products and services should be available to consumers and markets.”

Read full text of the letter here.

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