You've written brilliantly in the last 24-48 hours about essentially Silicon Valley's reaction to the events of the past week. The RNC and J.D. Vance being Trump's VP pick. Just summarize the reporting for us, please. Right. So there has been a huge outpouring of support for Trump and his VP nominee, Vance. Not only has Elon Musk and Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz, as well as David Sacks, Doug Leone, and Sean Maguire from Sequoia Capital, all of these tech and venture capital big names, very prominent people here in Silicon Valley have all lined up to support Trump. And in recent weeks, with gaining momentum as more and more seem to like what he has to say about tech policy. Specifically, they realize in some ways this might be controversial for those that are in that family. That's certainly what Ben Horowitz spoke to, that people within that company.

Is that to take such an openly political
stance? But what is in it for small tech, as
they call it? Because from what we understand, while
the VP pick doesn't like big tech much. Right?
That's right. So on small tech, which is what Marc
Andreessen and Ben Horowitz, they call it their little tech agenda specifically
for startups. There's a couple of areas that they're
really hoping to to bend the ears of Trump and Vance on, including
potentially opening open sourcing A.I., loosening crypto regulation,
and possibly taking another look at the FTC in the antitrust regulations that
we've seen come down. And one of the reasons for that is
because although it does target big tech companies by preventing them from
acquiring smaller startups, it closes down that path as an exit for them.
And they can only IPO, which hasn't been very strong, hasn't been as strong in
recent years.

Is that we made the point on the show,
and we can illustrate it again with a visual representation of who has come
out in support of Trump. But it is many or some of Silicon
Valley. It's not all of Silicon Valley.
So what have you learned about any remaining support in that industry for
the Democratic Party or even those that have changed position along the way?
That's an excellent point, Ed. And again, the reason why this is so
significant on some ways is because it's been a major departure for many people
that have long time voted Democrat. But to your point, it's certainly not
all of Silicon Valley. These are some very prominent names that
are supporting him. But there's still a large contingent of
Democratic voters backing backing Biden. Certainly, you know, Steve Ballmer,
Marissa Mayer, quite a few others have traditionally supported Democrats.
And so, you know, the conversation is still very mixed.
It's certainly not all tech, and it's

certainly not all of Silicon Valley.
More broadly, is that is this likely to get louder as we go towards November?
Is it just that this is a moment in time where people lay their cards out and and
get on board the rest of those that they work with, and indeed the portfolio
companies understanding this? I think it will get increasingly louder,
more raucous, and potentially more more divisive.
If you look at some of the beefs happening right now playing out on the
platform because campaigns and, you know, gained steam as we get closer to
the election date. So I don't anticipate this ratcheting
down any time soon. Doesn't mean it won't stay civil.
We can, but we will look ahead to see how things will progress.

Andreessen, Horowitz Latest Tech VCs to Support Trump

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