Match Dating Apps Halt Political Donations After Abortion Backlash
People were only upset about the donations to a group that helped overturn Roe v. Wade but better to be safe than sorry, I guess?
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Tinder’s own company morals (if a company can have those) have been overshadowed by its parent company’s political donations. After the dating app enjoyed a day of good press over letting people take a stand for abortion while swiping, Match Group is in hot water.
The company—which dominates the American dating app market with Tinder, OkCupid, Hinge, Plenty of Fish, and the titular Match—announced Thursday it would suspend all political donations to both Republican and Democratic state attorneys general organizations. The Republican Attorneys General Association (RAGA) was a key ally in the fight to win Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, the Supreme Court case in June that overturned Roe v. Wade. Match Group donated $137,000 to RAGA in 2021. And while the company also gave a six-figure donation to the Democratic counterpart, the Democratic state attorneys general weren’t trying to eliminate the constitutional right to abortion.
“I learned about the donations to RAGA the same way most of you did, when I saw it in the media,” CEO Bernard Kim wrote in a staff memo, according to The New York Times. “It’s my responsibility to understand how these donations fit into our larger lobbying activity, and determine what we will do moving forward.”
It’s wild for a CEO to admit they were caught unaware of their own company’s political donations. There has never been a more critical time for a company to be aware of how it is contributing to a failing world—particularly a company like Match Group, which should be concerned that if their clientele is worried about having to carry unplanned pregnancies, then they’ll likely be losing that clientele.
In 2021, the company got its first taste of excellent press after announcing it would cover abortion-related travel for its Texas employees in the wake of S.B. 8, the state bill that banned abortion after 6 weeks. But these recent political donations show the limits of praising corporations for their actions. You can’t give someone a gold star for paying for an employee to access healthcare with one hand if, with the other hand, they are actively donating to the people hellbent on repealing said healthcare.
Currently, RAGA is spending $682,000 in ads to beat Wisconsin’s Attorney General Josh Kaul, an abortion rights supporter. The organization is also breaking its own fundraising efforts in its quest to elect Republicans. So, the democratic state attorneys generals probably need corporate dollars now more than ever.
County, parish, and state attorney generals are the front line of deciding whether or not to bring charges against someone who has had or performed an abortion. So it seems like a company that claims to want to keep abortion accessible would be interested in getting those kinds of politicians elected.