WASHINGTON: Hundreds of Silicon Valley venture capitalists, investors, and tech leaders have rallied to support Kamala Harris for the White House, pushing back at unexpected inroads her rival Donald Trump has made in the tech world through Tesla‘s Elon Musk and early PayPal investor and CEO Peter Thiel.
In a statement under the aegis of a group called VCsForKamala, the tech leaders, including Linked-in founder Reid Hoffman, Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, and Sun Microsystems co-founder Vinod Khosla said they are united in their support for Kamala Harris in this “pivotal moment.”
“We are pro-business, pro-American dream, pro-entrepreneurship and pro-technological progress…We also believe in democracy as the backbone of our nation.We believe that strong, trustworthy institutions are a feature, not a bug and that our industry – and every other industry – would collapse without them.” the group said in a statement, now signed by more than 700 tech leaders.
The public rallying for Kamala Harris, who was district attorney of San Francisco and attorney general of California before she became a Senator from the state, comes amid efforts by Trump backers to characterize her as a left-liberal politician whose policies would be detrimental to the tech world. They specifically accuse her of being against cryptocurrency, which Trump has been talking up lately, and showing support by attending a Bitcoin conference last week.
Democrat activists say the backing from Kamala from so many VCs “is a powerful rebuke to far-right Silicon Valley billionaires like Elon Musk who have thrown their support behind Donald Trump’s fascist movement in the hopes of more tax cuts.”
Incidentally, the Congressional district in which much of Silicon Valley is located is represented by Democratic lawmaker Ro Khanna, an Indian-American whose father-in-law Monte Ahuja is a Republican supporter.
In fact, the Trump v Harris battle has caused an unprecedented schism in the tech world with public online spats among principals who have often worked together in the past. Notably Hoffman, Thiel, and Musk were part of what was called the “PayPal mafia” before they went their own way, first in the companies they invested in, and now politically.
Thiel has also been a patron of Trump’s vice-presidential nominee JD Vance, facilitating his entry into the VC world and bankrolling his election as a Senator.
Much of the Silicon Valley drift towards Trump was precipitated by what some saw as tough regulatory policies of the Biden administration. Elon Musk is particularly agitated by what he characterizes as the left’s “woke virus.”
But Harris, who has been cosy with the tech world for many years, is seen as a potential ally despite Trump’s efforts to portray her as “radical left.” She is said to be close to Democratic mega-donor Laurene Powell Jobs, the billionaire philanthropist and wife of the late Steve Jobs, and former Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg, and its President Sean Parker, whose wedding she attended.
Then there are also family links: Tony West, her brother-in-law (married to her sister Meena Harris) is the general counsel of Uber, and her husband Doug Emhoff was a litigator whose clients included Walmart and Merck.
In a statement under the aegis of a group called VCsForKamala, the tech leaders, including Linked-in founder Reid Hoffman, Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, and Sun Microsystems co-founder Vinod Khosla said they are united in their support for Kamala Harris in this “pivotal moment.”
“We are pro-business, pro-American dream, pro-entrepreneurship and pro-technological progress…We also believe in democracy as the backbone of our nation.We believe that strong, trustworthy institutions are a feature, not a bug and that our industry – and every other industry – would collapse without them.” the group said in a statement, now signed by more than 700 tech leaders.
The public rallying for Kamala Harris, who was district attorney of San Francisco and attorney general of California before she became a Senator from the state, comes amid efforts by Trump backers to characterize her as a left-liberal politician whose policies would be detrimental to the tech world. They specifically accuse her of being against cryptocurrency, which Trump has been talking up lately, and showing support by attending a Bitcoin conference last week.
Democrat activists say the backing from Kamala from so many VCs “is a powerful rebuke to far-right Silicon Valley billionaires like Elon Musk who have thrown their support behind Donald Trump’s fascist movement in the hopes of more tax cuts.”
Incidentally, the Congressional district in which much of Silicon Valley is located is represented by Democratic lawmaker Ro Khanna, an Indian-American whose father-in-law Monte Ahuja is a Republican supporter.
In fact, the Trump v Harris battle has caused an unprecedented schism in the tech world with public online spats among principals who have often worked together in the past. Notably Hoffman, Thiel, and Musk were part of what was called the “PayPal mafia” before they went their own way, first in the companies they invested in, and now politically.
Thiel has also been a patron of Trump’s vice-presidential nominee JD Vance, facilitating his entry into the VC world and bankrolling his election as a Senator.
Much of the Silicon Valley drift towards Trump was precipitated by what some saw as tough regulatory policies of the Biden administration. Elon Musk is particularly agitated by what he characterizes as the left’s “woke virus.”
But Harris, who has been cosy with the tech world for many years, is seen as a potential ally despite Trump’s efforts to portray her as “radical left.” She is said to be close to Democratic mega-donor Laurene Powell Jobs, the billionaire philanthropist and wife of the late Steve Jobs, and former Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg, and its President Sean Parker, whose wedding she attended.
Then there are also family links: Tony West, her brother-in-law (married to her sister Meena Harris) is the general counsel of Uber, and her husband Doug Emhoff was a litigator whose clients included Walmart and Merck.