Stripe, PayPal, and Shopify lead e-commerce's divorce from Trump

Silicon Valley's largest companies are rapidly distancing themselves from outgoing President Donald Trump, following last week's right wing domestic terrorist attack on the Capitol.

Stripe over the weekend halted Trump's campaign account for violating policies that encourage violence, Stripe confirmed Monday morning in an email. Stripe is the latest technology firm to take action against Trump, following PayPal, Shopify and GoFundMe.

The e-commerce bans mostly impact Trump's online stores, selling MAGA and Trump-related merchandise and performing general fundraising. In the case of PayPal, it also banned groups raising money to fund travel and protest expenses, such as Joy in Liberty.

The e-commerce and payment bans come alongside a series of moves from other technology companies and social networks, including Twitter, Facebook, Snap, Pinterest and TikTok, which have cut off Trump mostly due to the use of those platforms to spread messaging and support organizing tied to protests against Joe Biden's election. Those protests turned violent last week, leading to swift action from the technology sites.

Bloomberg News

The commerce-related bans put Trump, his campaign store and related protest groups in league with right wing groups that PayPal and the major card brands banned following deadly protests in Charlottesville, Va., in 2017.

The Charlottesville incident gave rise to a website from Color of Change called bloodmoney.org, which calls out financial services companies that do business with hate groups. It also drew attention to the use of cryptocurrencies to fund fringe political sites.

On Monday, founders of a blockchain firm called DreamReal invited Trump to a social network that uses its own token to fund and incentivize content creation and social networking. The Southern Poverty Law Center maintains a list of far-right organizations that use cryptocurrency to support fundraising.

For the most part, mainstream financial services firms have not directly barred Trump-related transactions, though many have curtailed political donations. Among traditional financial institutions, JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs and Citigroup have paused political donations, with JPMorgan using that time to reconsider its political donation strategy.