Why the C.E.O. Behind Match.com and Tinder Took a Stand on the Texas Abortion Law
It was a particularly tense moment in the online dating world: a couple of weeks before the May 15 deadline, the New York Times’s Megan Twohey had written an article about Match.com that called the Texas law — which bans abortion after 20 weeks of pregnancy — “the most restrictive abortion law in the country.” But that only encouraged the pro-abortion activists behind the controversial bill to argue that it was a mere “tinker with the law.”
Twohey’s article sparked an intense debate on Facebook and other pro-abortion sites, leading several websites to put out their own responses to her arguments. The pro-abortion site the Federalist pointed out that “most states don’t even have abortion bans,” while the National Review explained how Texas did indeed have an “intriguing” law.
A few days later, on May 19, The Daily Beast obtained a leaked copy of the e-mail correspondence between David Bohnett, chief executive of Austin-based Match.com, and his counterpart, Tim Matheson, who runs two of the company’s top investors: George Soros and Marc Andreessen. The e-mail said that Match.com would no longer advertise the controversial Texas abortion law on its website if the Texas law passed.
In it, Match’s leaders expressed their deep desire to “protect [Match.com] from the negative publicity that would come with a challenge to this law,” and explained that they would be giving “significant consideration to alternatives to advertising the law.”
The e-mail contained a copy of a proposed cease-and-desist letter to Texas, which was signed by both CEO and chief executive officer, and then sent from the Match.com offices in Austin.
“We’re also going to be doing something different than we’ve ever done before,” said the e-mail,
