Are all the Silicon Valley bosses turning to Trump?

This past weekend, almost all social media headlines and comment sections in the United States were dominated by news that Trump had been shot.

On the evening of July 13th local time, former US President Donald Trump was attacked by a gunman while attending a campaign rally in Pennsylvania. He was hit in the right ear by a bullet. He then left the scene under the protection of Secret Service personnel. The gunman who carried out the attack was shot dead.

Trump later issued a statement describing his injuries, "I felt my skin was torn and there was a lot of blood." He thanked the law enforcement officers for their quick response, expressed condolences to the families of the victims and injured spectators, and said that he would proceed with the next itinerary as originally planned, "May God bless America."

The photo taken by an Associated Press reporter at the first moment became a "freeze frame in history."

1. Musk compared it to Roosevelt, and Altman, Nadella and others tweeted...

X became the main focus of the discussion. Many founders, investors, and CEOs in Silicon Valley also expressed their views.

Musk immediately made it clear that he supports Trump. He said he would fully endorse "President Trump" and hoped that he would recover soon.

Some even compared Trump's strong performance to that of Roosevelt, one of the greatest former presidents known as the "shaper of modern America."

He also empathized that his life had been threatened: "In the past eight months, two people have tried to kill me on different occasions. They were arrested with guns about 20 minutes' drive from Tesla headquarters." In less than a day, Musk had posted and retweeted as many as 15 tweets on his X account, openly canvassing for votes for Trump.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman usually rarely publishes content unrelated to the industry, and recently he has not posted anything on X for more than a month, which is unusual. This time, he immediately posted two posts after Trump was shot, first saying "I am glad that President Trump is safe." Later, as more and more Trump supporters followed his tweet, he added that he was moved to see that everyone "jointly decided to ease the rhetoric and find more unity" instead of "succumbing to the impulse of the two sides to oppose each other."

The company's president and chairman, as well as deputy chief executive Greg Brockman, followed suit, expressing gratitude that President Trump was safe and sound and that the shooting was "an attack on American democracy."

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella "extends his best wishes for a speedy recovery."

Apple CEO Tim Cook said "my heart goes out to him and the victims" and strongly condemned the violence.

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, who had previously had a tense relationship with Trump, broke his nine-month silence on social media and praised "our former President Trump for showing great grace and courage in the face of real bullets."

Marc Andreessen, co-founder of a16z, who was once a public critic of Trump and said that Trump's proposal to restrict immigration was "disgusting," has recently begun criticizing the Biden administration. Although he has not explicitly stated his support for Trump, he also posted a picture of the American flag.

2. “It seems like all of Silicon Valley supports Trump”

Many people have also sensed subtle changes in political stance within Silicon Valley.

Altman’s Twitter comments hit the nail on the head: “It looks like the entire Silicon Valley supports Trump. Finally.”

Others described it as, “Silicon Valley is now the new Texas.”

Once upon a time, Silicon Valley, a "liberal bastion", was the first echelon that resolutely opposed Trump. As a representative of innovation, openness and globalization, Silicon Valley strongly relies on international talents and a free business environment, and advocates environmental protection and social progress.

Trump is synonymous with "conservatism" and "protectionism".

He has implemented strict immigration policies and tightened restrictions on H-1B visas, which have been criticized by many company leaders for hindering innovation and talent introduction; he has launched antitrust investigations into technology giants and strengthened supervision of social media platforms, which have been accused of excessive interference in free expression, which is contrary to the open and free Internet spirit advocated by Silicon Valley; the trade war launched against China and other countries has brought challenges to technology companies that rely on global supply chains and markets, causing widespread concern; while Silicon Valley companies generally attach importance to sustainable development, promise to reduce carbon emissions and invest in clean energy projects, the Trump administration has implemented a "de-climate change" policy, which has aroused strong dissatisfaction in the technology community...

It can be said that the differences and disagreements between the two sides in values ​​and policies have a long history, and even reached the point of tension at one point.

Twitter, Facebook and other platforms have blocked Trump's social accounts and banned him directly. Although Musk is "loyal" now, when Trump announced his withdrawal from the Paris Climate Agreement in 2017, he withdrew from three presidential advisory committees in one go, calling Trump "a liar", and voted for Biden in 2020.

Trump called Musk "a master of nonsense". During the last election campaign, Trump often attacked Bezos, saying that he used The Washington Post to avoid taxes, published defamatory reports, and had "huge antitrust problems". Bezos hit back, saying that he "hoped to use his own rocket to send Trump into space".

There is also Bill Ackman, the American hedge fund tycoon, founder and CEO of Pershing Square. After the Capitol Hill incident on January 6, 2021, Bill Ackman publicly criticized Trump, believing that he should "resign and apologize to all Americans", raising serious doubts about his leadership ability.

Now Bill Ackman has made a 180-degree turn. Yesterday, he posted a long article publicly declaring that he would "officially support Trump's presidential campaign." He also said that he had the opportunity to spend a few hours with Trump recently, which gave him a deeper understanding of Trump. This decision was made "after careful and rational thinking, and based on a lot of empirical data."

How come... everything changed suddenly?

Someone commented on X that Silicon Valley's attitude had already changed, and this shooting incident gave everyone the most reasonable opportunity to speak up.

As a result, the few who were still "holding their ground" were now in a "difficult situation".

As a long-time public opponent of Trump, Reid Hoffman, co-founder of LinkedIn and the "king of connections" in Silicon Valley, has condemned his leadership style on many occasions as being harmful to the rule of law and business environment in the United States and unacceptable in inciting violence.

As a result, Musk brought up a recent public dispute between Hoffman and Stanford alumnus, PayPal founder and well-known investor Peter Thiel. During the verbal exchange, Thiel sarcastically thanked Hoffman for funding the lawsuits against Trump, arguing that these lawsuits turned Trump into a "martyr" and thus increased his chances of re-election. Hoffman responded sarcastically: "Yeah, I really hope to turn him into a real martyr."

Musk retweeted the post and said: "The Reid Hoffmans of the world got what they wanted most. But the martyr survived." He implied that although those who oppose Trump have made a lot of efforts, these have not only failed, but have instead fulfilled the saying "Whatever doesn't kill me makes me stronger."

This tweet attracted a large number of excited Trump supporters, who mocked Reid Hoffman. Some people also said that this person is undoubtedly the only suspect.

This forced Hoffman to personally respond. He reiterated that he firmly opposed violence, and that Trump should not have encouraged violence during the riots in Congress. In addition, in the debate with Thiel, the so-called "hope that Trump will become a martyr" refers to being responsible for his lies and actions, not being physically hurt.

As a result... he was scolded again. Some people in the comment section called him Reid "woke" Hoffman, some asked him to apologize, and some asked him to delete his account directly. Naval Ravikant, a legendary Silicon Valley investor and the "founder of equity crowdfunding", criticized, "Stop funding and defending the legal battle. That monster will eventually devour you, too."

3. "Openly supporting Trump will not face the same reaction and opposition as eight years ago"

In fact, Silicon Valley’s shift in direction has been going on for some time.

More than a month ago, Trump held a fundraiser here hosted by investor David O. Sacks and Chamath Palihapitiya at Sacks' San Francisco mansion.

Tickets for the event ranged from $50,000 to $500,000, with VIP treatment such as "priority dinner seats" and "photos with Trump" requiring a donation of $300,000. Tickets were sold out early, attracting many Silicon Valley technology leaders and investors, including Blackstone Group CEO Steve Schwarzman, the Winklevoss brothers in the cryptocurrency field, data analysis provider Palantir Technologies senior policy advisor Jacob Helberg, and the aforementioned billionaire Bill Ackman, raising a total of $12 million in campaign funds.

Helberg, who has donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to the Biden administration in the past, publicly donated $1 million to Trump this time and said that now "when people like me publicly support Trump, they will not face the same reaction and opposition as they did eight years ago."

This change is not because of how good Trump is, but rather because of the support from his peers. Some commentators said that Silicon Valley may not have been very supportive of Trump, but they have indeed become very opposed to Biden.

From the initial strong opposition to the recent gradual support, the balance tilting towards Trump is actually driven by dissatisfaction with the current US economic policies, regulatory environment, and the Biden administration.

For example, in terms of industry regulation, the Biden administration is conducting antitrust investigations on technology giants such as Nvidia, Microsoft, and OpenAI. Its high-pressure supervision in emerging technology fields such as cryptocurrency and AI has caused many people in Silicon Valley to worry that it will severely restrict technological innovation and industry development.

The Trump administration has promoted deregulation measures in many industries to reduce corporate compliance burdens and operating costs. For example, in 2018, it proposed reducing federal government regulation and regulatory barriers to self-driving cars and encouraging state governments and private companies to provide greater flexibility for technology development and testing. Since then, Waymo and Tesla's business has grown significantly; it instructed the FAA to simplify the commercial licensing process for drones, prompting Amazon and UPS to expand the coverage of drone delivery services.

In terms of economic policy and tax reform, in 2017, Trump passed the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which cut the corporate tax rate from 35% to 21%. It also lowered personal income tax rates for high-income earners while increasing the standard deduction. He also introduced a minimum tax rate on foreign income, designed to encourage American companies to repatriate overseas profits. This is particularly beneficial to Silicon Valley's technology companies and the large group of "rich people" behind them. In fact, Trump has also hinted that as long as he is in power, he will serve the immediate economic interests of the top 1%, or even 0.001%, of the rich, who are the group of Silicon Valley's bigwigs.

In contrast, Biden proposed to raise the corporate tax rate from 21% to 28% to increase federal revenue. Increase taxes on individuals with annual incomes over $400,000 and cancel some tax breaks for high-income earners. Taxes on annual incomes over $1 million will be as high as 39.6%. The money was used to build infrastructure and provide social welfare, but not only did it not produce any results, it also created "zero-dollar shopping." As a result, the middle class and wealthy people in Silicon Valley have become precise targets of sniping, complaining and suffering.

Therefore, although Silicon Valley tends to be Democratic on social and cultural issues and supports freedom, diversity and social progress, it still shows a conservative and pragmatic side when faced with its own economic interests in order to protect its own growth and competitiveness.

Shaun Maguire, a partner at Sequoia who was once a member of Trump's opposition but has now turned into an active supporter, wrote in a post, "The public has been led to believe that Trump is Hitler, when in fact he is Churchill."

The change in the positions of people around him made AngelList founder Babak Nivi sigh, "Today may be the biggest change in American political views since 9/11."

Of course, there are still many people who think that all this is just a show. Some netizens ruthlessly exposed Maguire:

"Silicon Valley technologists are the least confrontational people on the planet. They are the most sheep-like and will say and do whatever is currently popular. This is simply ridiculous that he deleted all (anti-)Trump tweets until 2023."

A recent article in the Financial Times also pointed out the shift in Silicon Valley’s mainstream attitude toward Trump. At the end of the article, the author wrote that when Trump is re-elected with the support of Silicon Valley, “by then, many American business leaders, Republicans and Democrats, will look back at the Biden administration with a hint of regret.”