UPDATE: Venmo is allowing the family to transfer the funds into a bank account.
The 7-year-old boy from Texas who had made a hot chocolate stand to raise money for Trump’s wall has now had the $15,000 he raised seized by Venmo who says that they are holding the funds until he turns 18.
The parents of Benton Stevens had helped him set up a hot chocolate stand in a strip mall earlier this month with a large sign that said the proceeds would go to help build a wall on the southern border. In about an hour, the young activist had raised $221 dollars before people complained to the owner of the store where he had set up his stand and they made him take it down.
“I guess some liberals – or whatever you want to call them – they were griping at the owner (of the store) and going in and yelling at him and slamming him on Facebook,” Jennifer said.
The stand promptly went viral online, so the family set up a Venmo account so that people who were moved and wanted to contribute could do so.
His parents, Jennifer and Shane, are both members of the Republican National Committee and were planning to donate the funds to Brian Kolfage’s “We Build the Wall” effort to privately fund the construction. They say that he wanted to do something to help after the family watched President Donald Trump’s State of the Union address together.
According to a report from Fox News, after the stand became a viral sensation, their son was subjected to bullying — even called “little Hitler.”
“He was called a little Hitler yesterday,” his mother said. “A guy pointed at him in his car and then he said that we didn’t like brown people. I don’t understand that at all.”
Between the stand, generous online donors, and a donor who was willing to match what he raised — Kolfage told the Gateway Pundit that there was nearly $15,000 in his Venmo account when the company froze it.
The family told the Gateway Pundit that Venmo did freeze the account, “but they are allowing us to transfer the funds out.”
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We have reached out to Venmo for comment and will update this article if one is provided.
