WASHINGTON—The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has issued warning letters to four payment companies to stop debanking people based on political and religious beliefs. Visa, Mastercard, PayPal and Stripe were the recipients of the letters that were issued on Thursday, citing publicly reported instances of users being blocked from services.
“Full participation in commerce and public life necessarily requires that law-abiding individuals can access, and freely participate in, our financial system,” FTC chair Andrew Ferguson stated.
He added, "It is inconsistent with American values to deny law-abiding individuals the ability to run their legitimate businesses and feed their families because they attracted the ire of rogue American officials, overzealous activists, or, more worryingly, foreign governments seeking to control public discourse."
Ferguson explained, “That is why President Trump’s August 7, 2025, executive order on debanking makes clear that it is unacceptable to debank law-abiding citizens due to ‘political affiliations, religious beliefs, or lawful business activities.’”
AVN reported on the executive order at the time, indicating that the Trump White House had defined such an order to cover industries considered controversial and high-risk to the banking and financial services industries. The Free Speech Coalition interpreted the Trump order to cover adult entertainment.
Debanking has been a consistent issue for adult entertainment professionals. For years, there has been anecdotal, journalistic and academic documentation to contribute to the claim that debanking disproportionately harms sex workers and commercial sex industry stakeholders.
"The federal banking regulators shall also consider rescinding or amending existing regulations, consistent with applicable law, to eliminate or amend any regulations that could result in politicized or unlawful debanking and to ensure that any regulated firm’s or individual’s reputation is considered for regulatory, supervisory, banking, or enforcement purposes solely to the extent necessary to reach a reasonable and apolitical risk-based assessment," Trump's executive order reads.
