Advertisement

Twitter, PayPal, and Venmo ban Ali Alexander, who organized DC's 'Stop the Steal' rally where Trump incited the Capitol riot

capitol siege rally trump
  • Ali Alexander, an organizer of the "Stop the Steal" rally that led to a riot in the Capitol building that resulted in the death of five people, has been banned from Twitter, Venmo, and PayPal.

  • As the mob stormed the building last week, he posted a Twitter video of himself saying "I don't disavow this."

  • Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

Ali Alexander, an organizer of Wednesday's "Stop the Steal" rally in Washington, DC, has been banned from Twitter.

The rally, where President Donald Trump spoke before his supporters stormed the US Capitol building in an incident that resulted in the death of five people, was the capstone on a series of "Stop the Steal" events since November.

The events sought to organize around and promote the lie that Trump, rather than President-elect Joe Biden, was the true winner of the 2020 presidential election. Biden won 306 electoral college votes to Trump's 232, and a popular vote margin of more than 7 million. Trump and his allies have filed more than 40 lawsuits challenging the results, but none have been successful.

Alexander was suspended from Twitter Sunday. In an Instagram story, he said the suspension was permanent.

He also said on Parler that he was banned from PayPal and Venmo. A representative for PayPal, which owns Venmo, told Insider the account was "closed due to a violation of our Acceptable Use Policy."

Alexander still maintains a presence on Patreon, which didn't immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.

Deleted tweets from Alexander reviewed by The Daily Beast show he frequently used the phrase "1776" as a threat directed to opponents of Trump's efforts to overturn the election results.

"If they do this, everyone can guess what me and 500,000 others will do to that building," Alexander tweeted on December 30, according to the Daily Beast. "1776 is *always* an option."

At the January 6 rally, he led a chant of "victory or death!"

As rioters stormed the Capitol, he posted a video to Twitter where he said "I don't disavow this."

"I think people should be rowdy, I think people should be messy," he also said in a video posted to Twitter, according to the Daily Beast. "I do believe that we own that U.S. Capitol. So I'm not apologizing for nothing."

"Conflating our legally, peaceful permitted events with the breach of the US Capitol building is defamatory and false," Alexander said in an Instagram story Sunday.

In another Instagram story, he posted a screenshot showing that several of his stories were removed for "violence or dangerous organizations."

Alexander didn't immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.

Twitter banned Trump permanently from the platform on Friday, citing tweets they said glorified violence. It also banned several other pro-Trump figures.

Major tech platforms like Google and Apple's app store and Amazon Web Services have also cracked down on speech they view as pro-violence, removing services for Parler, a social network widely viewed as a haven for white supremacists.

Expanded Coverage Module: capitol-siege-module

Read the original article on Business Insider