Fund a ‘violation’
while denying allegations GoFundMe had “buckled to demands” to remove it.
Mr Solomon also dismissed claims the company did not support religious causes, saying it was “wide open for business” from churches of all denominations.
The Australian Christian Lobby launched a rival online crowd-funding site to collect donations for Folau’s legal battle against Rugby Australia and Rugby NSW yesterday, attracting more than $1 million in its first day.
Folau had his rugby contract terminated in May over Instagram posts claiming “hell awaits” gay people, and last Friday launched a GoFundMe campaign to raise $3 million to fight his dismissal in court.
The campaign raised more than $700,000, but Mr Solomon said it was quickly flagged as a possible violation of GoFundMe policies and was removed on Monday, with donations refunded in full.
“To some people it might not be crystal clear that this is a violation, while others may have a different interpretation,” Mr Solomon said.
“Internally, we take it very seriously. We don’t want to rush to judgment. We want to factor in everything, and everything is reviewed with a multi-tiered assessment of our policy.”
GoFundMe policy vicepresident Danny Gordon said the platform’s investigation team identified Folau’s fundraiser as questionable and immediately froze all donations.
The review took “a couple of days” longer than usual due to the weekend, he said, and ultimately decided the campaign breached policies about funding the legal defence of “intolerance of any kind relating to … sexual orientation”.
Mr Gordon said it was “relatively rare” to remove campaigns from GoFundMe.
He would not comment on a similar campaign on the site raising funds for a Canadian preacher accused of anti-gay slurs.
A Folau spokesman called GoFundMe’s decision “disappointing” and said the company had “buckled to demands against the freedom of Australians to donate to this cause”.