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Exposes how companies like Visa, Chase, PayPal, Bank of America, and Mastercard use their power to silence dissenting voices and hurt democracy through the practice of financial censorship Civil liberties activist Rainey Reitman introduces readers to the concept of “financial censorship”—a form of privatized censorship where banks and payment intermediaries act as censors in ways the government couldn’t do directly without violating the First Amendment. Reitman examines financial companies and the role they have played in policing speech, as well as the laws and corporate policies that have enabled this form of censorship. Weaving together over a decade of research with interviews and narratives from those personally impacted by financial censorship, Reitman reveals how financial exclusion has become a tool to pressure marginalized voices into silence. From the executive director of a voting rights nonprofit to a teacher of Iranian poetry