Languishing PayPal’s Woke CEO Leaves Earlier Than Planned

PayPal’s woke CEO Dan Schulman is set to step down earlier than planned after the company’s shares plummeted over 75 percent in just two years. The company had announced in February that he intended to stay on until December 31, but now Schulman’s successor, Alex Chriss, will assume the role on September 27.

While PayPal’s share price was in free fall, Schulman allowed Orwellian schemes like the penalization of users $2,500 for spreading “misinformation.” After intense backlash, PayPal ditched the initiative, but the stock had already dropped 6 percent in one day. While most of the tech market rallied in the first half of 2022, PayPal’s stock price continued to fall. The firm has since claimed the policy of fining users for misinformation was an error.

The campaign was just one of Schulman’s efforts that led PayPal to adopt woke social policies.

In 2016, the firm scrapped plans for a new operations center in Charlotte that would have employed 400, after North Carolina unveiled a bill that would protect women’s safety by preventing transgender individuals from using the bathroom of their choice.

Also, according to USA Today, “on his watch, PayPal committed $535 million to support black-owned businesses and to fight economic inequality, part of Schulman’s goal to close the racial wealth gap.” These affirmative action-type policies are themselves unfair and earlier this year the Supreme Court struck down similar programs in higher education. In reality they merely expand racial divides.

For these and other reasons, Paul Chesser, director of NLPC’s Corporate Integrity Project, advocated at this year’s annual meeting for Verizon shareholders to oppose Schulman for its board. Schulman gained majority support, but PayPal’s underperformance shows the arguments made against Schulman were justified. His exit should serve as a warning to executives who put their personal political preferences above their fiduciary responsibility to shareholders.