Silicon Valley, long known for its left-leaning business leaders, is looking a little less liberal this year. But reports that it’s turning into a Republican stronghold have been exaggerated.
In the past three days, since President Joe Biden made the historic announcement that he would not run for a second term only weeks before the Democratic National Convention, a steady drip of tech leaders have made public endorsements for Vice President Kamala Harris, the presumptive Democratic nominee. And many of Silicon Valley’s donors are energized by the latest turn in the campaign.
Here’s a look at which camps tech titans are splitting into when it comes to the presidential election.
Harris has already won public endorsements from heavy hitters including Reid Hoffman, investor and cofounder of LinkedIn, and Reed Hastings, ski resort owner and cofounder of Netflix, who reportedly donated $7 million to the Harris campaign. Former Meta COO Sheryl Sandberg took to Instagram to say she was “thrilled” to support Harris.
“Vice President @kamalaharris has already made history once — becoming the first Black and South Asian woman to hold her office, and she will do it again in November," Sandberg wrote. "She is an accomplished leader, a fierce advocate of abortion rights, and the strongest candidate to lead our country forward."
Several other tech leaders made six-figure donations to the Biden Victory Fund super political action committee this campaign season, which has been renamed the Harris Victory Fund. Data from the FEC shows the super PAC received money from Laurene Powell Jobs, entrepreneur, philanthropist, and widow to Apple co-founder Steve Jobs; Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI; and David Ellison, the founder and CEO of Skydance who is set to lead Paramount after the two companies merge. (His father, Larry Ellison, founder of Oracle, has been a loyal supporter of the Republican party.)
Whether those donors will voice their support of Harris remains to be seen, as her history with Silicon Valley is complicated. Though she has friendships with tech figures, including Jobs, and has reassured donors that she is a "capitalist," she was also tough on tech giants like Facebook and PayPal when she was California's attorney general.
The messages of support for Harris this week from the Silicon Valley elite contrast with the recent narrative about tech moving to the right. Powerbrokers like investors Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz came out in support of Republican candidate Donald Trump last week. Billionaire Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla and owner of the social media site X (formerly Twitter) endorsed Trump in a public statement in the wake of the mid-July assassination attempt that almost took Trump's life. Musk denied media reports that he also pledged $45 million per month to Trump’s campaign, but shared in an interview on X that he did create a super PAC to pool donations for the Republican candidate. Republican vice president candidate J.D. Vance, an Ohio senator, also has close ties with Peter Thiel, the billionaire VC, and former Google CEO Eric Schmidt, who were among the tech royalty who backed Vance for his senate run.
Last month, billionaire venture capitalist and Chamath Palihapitiya and David Sacks, a venture capitalist and member of the so-called "PayPal Mafia," hosted a fundraiser in San Francisco for Trump.
Several other tech leaders are likely to remain silent about their preferred candidates. Although Mark Zuckerberg, Meta founder and CEO, said in an interview that he was stirred to see Trump stand up and pump his fist in the air after the recent attempt on his life—Zuckerberg called Trump a “badass”—he did not officially endorse either candidate.
That’s standard practice for influential CEOs, and those leading Amazon, Apple, Nvidia, Google, and others are sticking with tradition.
