PayPal Partners With ADL To ‘Fight Extremism And Hate’ By Researching, Disrupting Payments

The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) announced Monday a partnership initiative with PayPal to combat perceived extremism and bigotry in the financial industry.

The initiative, led by the ADL’s Center on Extremism, will focus on researching funding networks of “extremist and hate movements,” the ADL announced in a statement Monday. The partnership will then share its research with policymakers and law enforcement officials, as well as with civil rights organizations and actors in the financial industry, to disrupt “the financial pipelines that support extremist and hate movements.”

“By identifying partners across sectors with common goals and complementary resources, we can make an even greater impact than any of us could do on our own,” Aaron Karczmer, chief risk officer at PayPal, said in the statement.

PayPal previously suspended service for organizations that funded travel expenses for those traveling to Washington, D.C., on Jan. 6  following the Capitol riots. The payment processor also banned conservative site Jihad Watch in August 2017 following violence at a white supremacist rally in Charlottesville.

While the partnership will focus on the criminal activities of extremist groups, the scope of the initiative will include those participating in hateful conduct against “marginalized communities.”

“Thrilled to announce ADL’s new partnership to fight extremism with PayPal, ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt said in the statement.

“In addition to extremist and anti-government organizations, the initiative will focus on actors and networks spreading and profiting from all forms of hate and bigotry against any community,” the statement read.

The ADL has previously labeled prominent conservative commentators as bigots, referring to former MSNBC contributor Patrick Buchanan as an “unrepentant bigot” and accusing Fox News host Tucker Carlson in April of espousing “dangerous race-baiting, extreme rhetoric” and “classic white supremacist tropes.”

The initiative will also share research with civil rights organizations and “vulnerable communities” in order to protect them from threats of extremism.

“We have a unique opportunity to further understand how hate spreads and develop key insights that will inform the efforts of the financial industry, law enforcement, and our communities in mitigating extremist threats,” Greenblatt said.

“We hope to see more private and public partnerships such as these to help raise the social awareness of the public to the dangers that exist in plain sight,” Sindy Benavides, CEO of ADL partner organization the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), said in the statement. “Attacking these hateful groups’ revenue sources weakens their reach and exposes just how unstable they truly are.”

PayPal and the Anti-Defamation League did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.