Not sure what your point is. Mine from the beginning is there is no constitutional issue like free speech here as the government is not coercing Mastercard or Visa. There are a lot of other valid complaints and arguments but free speech is not one.
Not sure what your point is. Mine from the beginning is there is no constitutional issue like free speech here as the government is not coercing Mastercard or Visa. There are a lot of other valid complaints and arguments but free speech is not one.
I'm saying that Mastercard/Visa being able to do this on their own is one half of a free speech issue. It's not a free speech issue of its own, but it creates a free speech issue when combined with them being vulnerable to government pressure.
Imagine that the government instituted a private organization that had the power to cripple any business, with no recourse, and had control over it. The first amendment does not literally prohibit this, yet this would have clearly been a violation of the first amendment in spirit.