Donald Trump vs Hillary Clinton: What does Silicon Valley think of the US presidential candidates

The one thing that we’ve learned from this year’s US presidential elections, it’s the fact that Silicon Valley doesn’t want to see Trump in office. In terms of funding, Hillary Clinton’s collections have already outstripped Trump’s by a factor of 2. More telling is the fact that Clinton has 20 times the funding from Silicon Valley-based investors than Trump. To be clear, Clinton isn’t necessarily the favoured candidate as far as Silicon Valley is concerned. Looking at reports and stats, it’s quite evident that there more people are anti-trump than pro-Hillary. Pro-Hillary Dustin Moskovitz: This man is the co-founder of Facebook and together with his wife, the couple has donated in excess of $20 million to Clinton’s campaign. In a blog post on Medium, Moskovitz states that his wife and himself were trying to figure out “how to do the most good we can with the resources we’ve been given.”  He goes on to state that they consider themselves to be independent thinkers, capable of appreciating the ideas and vision of both parties involved in a presidential election. When Trump came into the picture, however, they felt compelled to act in the face of this presidential race’s polarising influence on the country. “It has become a referendum on who we want to be — as individuals, as a nation and as a society,” he says. Meg Whitman: She is at heart a republican, or was, till Trump came around. Meg Whitman is CEO of HP and a regularly raises funds for Republican nominees. This time it’s very different, however. Calling Trump a “demagogue” and a “threat to American democracy,” Whitman says that she’s voting for Hillary and will do her best to convince like-minded Republicans to do the same. [caption id=“attachment_337575” align=“aligncenter” width=“640”]  Image: Reuters[/caption] Meg Whitman has donated at least $150,000 to various pro-Hillary and anti-Trump campaigns. She has also raised a lot more for Hillary via fundraisers. Marc Benioff: Stating that Hillary Clinton is “by far the most qualified candidate to lead our country in these challenging times,” the founder of SalesForce clearly defines his position on the current US presidential race. Benioff and his wife have donated around $100,000 to Hillary’s campaign so far. There are a number of other supporters for Hillary Clinton, including Elon Musk, Chris Sakka and Sheryl Sandberg. Anti-Trump While Clinton’s campaign does seem to have a lot of support, the anti-Trump group is also quite prominent. This group’s members might even outnumber the pro-Hillary crowd. Tim Cook: Apple CEO Tim Cook held a fundraiser for Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton. He did this as a private citizen rather than as a representative of Apple. Please note that Tim Cook also held a fundraiser for Republican candidate Bernie Sanders. Trump has pointedly been excluded from these fundraisers. [caption id=“attachment_332155” align=“aligncenter” width=“640”]  Image: Reuters[/caption] A number of Apple employees have reportedly raised over $150,000 for various presidential candidates including Clinton and Bernie Sanders, but none of it seems to have gone to Trump. Steve Wozniak, Evan Williams and Pierre Omidyar: Apple’s co-founder, Twitter’s co-founder and eBay’s founder together with another 150 executives have penned a letter to Trump telling him exactly why they don’t support him.  Calling Trump’s potential presidency a “disaster for innovation,” they say that, ““His vision stands against the open exchange of ideas, free movement of people, and productive engagement with the outside world that is critical to our economy — and that provide the foundation for innovation and growth.” Jeff Bezos: Amazon’s CEO and founder and owner of 140 year old Washington Post, Jeff Bezos is quite clear about his disdain for Trump. Trump did target Bezos in one of his rants, after all, accusing Bezos of monopolizing ecommerce. Sundar Pichai: Google’s current CEO also has a bone to pick with Trump, specifically going after Trump for his racist remarks. In a post on the Medium titled, “ Let’s not let fear defeat our values,” Pichai places the spotlight on the “open-mindedness, tolerance and acceptance” of new Americans as the country’s greatest strength and most defining characteristic. [caption id=“attachment_257141” align=“aligncenter” width=“640”]  AP[/caption] He calls Trump’s rhetoric “disheartening” and “intolerant.” In the post, he goes on to describe the racially diverse employees at Google and the great contribution that they make to the company. He concludes with, “Let’s not let fear defeat our values. We must support Muslim and other minority communities in the US and around the world.” Pro-Trump As far as Donald Trump supporters are concerned, the only people who stand out are Peter Thiel , who hasn’t directly donated any money to Trump’s campaign, and Occulus' Palmer Luckey , who donated $10,000 to an anti-Hillary shitposting site.