The founders of well-known venture capital company Andreessen Horowitz, Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz, have reportedly informed staff members that they intend to donate to organizations that are endorsing Donald Trump’s presidential campaign.
The development comes one day after Donald Trump picked JD Vance as his running mate in the US presidential election, and three days after Trump survived an assassination attempt.
Andreessen and Horowitz are just the latest two tech billionaires to announce they’re backing Trump, something that Elon Musk is calling a shift in Silicon Valley. Musk himself has reportedly just pledged $45 million per month to a super PAC that supports Trump.
On a podcast released Tuesday, Andreessen and Horowitz said that communicating with the Biden administration has been “intensely frustrating” and a “totally intolerable situation.” The two say that the White House has refused to issue guidance on developing blockchain technology, and in fact has been suing start-up private companies looking to make their mark in the industry.
“So they’re kind of nuking the industry in that way,” Horowitz said.
On the other hand, the Trump campaign has issued a Republican Party Platform which includes statements of intent to champion innovation and “build the greatest economy in history.”
Andreessen celebrated actual statements from the Republican’s platform on his podcast, including their intent to lead the world in emerging tech industries such as crypto, oppose the creation of CBDCs, and defend the right to mine Bitcoin, all “free from government surveillance and control.”
“And so it’s just like a flat out like an endorsement in the entire space,” Andreessen said.
Vance a proponent of decentralization
JD Vance, a former venture capitalist himself, has expressed support for dismantling big tech firms, which is in line with the opinions of many startup investors and venture capitalists.
He’s also cited the Liberal Party of Canada as justification for cryptocurrency, after the Trudeau Government froze the bank accounts—without a court order—of some Freedom Convoy protesters and donors.
