KS AG warns credit card companies against tracking firearm purchases

TOPEKA – Credit card companies must not track firearm purchases, Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt has told the chief executive officers of three major credit card companies.

In the letter sent today to the CEOs of American Express, Mastercard and Visa, Schmidt and a coalition of 23 other state attorneys general say the monitoring and tracking of firearms purchases creates a “list of gun buyers” and creates the obvious risk that law-abiding consumers’ information will be obtained and misused by those who oppose Americans exercising their Second Amendment rights.

The attorneys general also warn that the recent creation of a Merchant Category Code for processing of firearms purchases from gun stores is potentially a violation of consumer protection and antitrust laws.

The new code for gun stores the credit card companies intend to adopt is the result of transnational collusion between large corporations leveraging their market power to further progress toward their desired social outcomes. Activists pressured the International Organization for Standardization to adopt this policy as a means of circumventing and undermining the American legislative process.

“Press releases from public officials make clear that the new merchant code was created and adopted in concert with various state actors, which may additionally create the potential for both civil and criminal liability for conspiracy to deprive Americans of their civil rights,” the attorneys general wrote. “Social policy should be debated and determined within our political institutions. Americans are tired of seeing corporate leverage used to advance political goals that cannot muster basic democratic support. The Second Amendment is a fundamental right, but it’s also a fundamental American value. Our financial institutions should stop lending their market power to those who wish to attack that value.”

A copy of the letter is available at https://bit.ly/3SdPdke.