On Thursday, it was revealed that the banking company PNC Financial Services Group Inc. had severed its business relationship with MxM News, the news aggregate website and app that had been launched by Donald Trump Jr. and former Trump spokesman Taylor Budowich.
As reported by Fox News, Trump Jr. and Budowich founded MxM News in March of 2022 as a competitor to mainstream news aggregate sites like Apple News and Google News, which, like the mainstream media itself, tend to have a left-wing bias and exclude conservative outlets.
Budowich said that he first learned of the decision by PNC when he went to a Florida branch and attempted to pay vendor invoices, only to be told that MxM News’ business account had been shut down.
“The teller said he was unable to complete the transfers as the account had been closed and balance had been zeroed out,” said Budowich. “After being told to call a generic help line, I was informed by the PNC representative that per the terms and conditions, PNC reserves the right to re-evaluate their business relationships at any time and terminate accounts without cause.”
Budowich described the decision as the latest example of left-wing corporations deliberately censoring conservative businesses and entities, saying that “woke corporations are using their terms and conditions like a guillotine over the head of every conservative entrepreneur.”
Donald Trump Jr., speaking to Fox News, said that MxM was created in order to “provide curated stories that are being silenced and or suppressed by big tech and the mainstream media.”
“However, as this shows, it’s not just the media that’s become plagued by the woke agenda. It’s banks, it’s the entire corporate America,” Trump Jr. continued, before suggesting that “we need a patriot economy. We need a parallel economy to fight back.”
Nevertheless, Trump Jr. added that PNC’s actions ultimately amounted to “a minor setback for MxM News that we were able to quickly resolve.”
“But what about every other start up, or small business who wants to pursue a values-based company?” asked Trump Jr. “This should be investigated, and it should be illegal to discriminate based on political affiliation.”
In response to backlash, PNC issued a statement refusing to comment on its actions with regards to MxM News, but nonetheless claiming that it does not shut down accounts based on the politics of the account owners.
“While PNC does not comment on the closure of specific accounts, which may occur for a variety of reasons, our account closure decisions are never driven by politics,” said PNC in a statement. “As a national bank, we recognize and respect that our customers and our employees hold a wide range of political beliefs.”