Venture capitalists (VCs) in Silicon Valley are breaking their silence on politics, publicly endorsing candidates like Donald Trump and Kamala Harris. This shift is driven by differing views on policies impacting tech innovation and startups.
For years, many of Silicon Valley ’s political discussions took place behind closed doors. Now, those casual debates have gone public — on podcasts, social media and online manifestos.Being a venture capitalist carries a lot of prestige in Silicon Valley . Those who choose which startups to fund see themselves as fostering the next big waves of technology.
“There are a lot of practical reasons for VCs to support Trump," including policies that could drive corporate profits and stock market values and favor wealthy benefactors, said David Cowan, an investor at Bessemer Venture Partners. But Cowan said he is supporting Harris as a VC with a “long-term investment horizon” because a “Trump world reeling from rampant income inequality, raging wars and global warming is not an attractive environment” for funding healthy businesses.
The schism in tech has left some firms split in their allegiances. Although venture capitalists Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz, founders of the firm that is their namesake, endorsed Trump, one of their firm’s general partners, John O’Farrell, pledged his support for Harris. O’Farrell declined further comment.
“The area where I disagree with Republicans the most is on women’s rights. And I’m sure I’ll disagree with some of Trump’s policies in the future,” Maguire wrote. “But in general I think he was surprisingly prescient.” Vance, a U.S. senator from Ohio who spent time in San Francisco working at Thiel's investment firm, voiced a similar perspective about “little tech” more than a month before he was chosen as Trump’s running mate.
Silicon Valley Venture Capitalists Politics Donald Trump Kamala Harris
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