It’s hard to name a more notable alumnus from the University of Illinois than Netscape co-founder Marc Andreessen, who was massively influential in the burgeoning of the internet, all from Champaign-Urbana. His influence in tech, specifically in Silicon Valley tech, is massive, and can be seen in the sheer amount of Boards of Directors on which he serves, which include Facebook, eBay and HP.
Generally a Republican, probably due to the nature of his work (venture capitalism), Andreessen recently came out against Donald Trump, saying this to Recode:
Andreessen spoke about Silicon Valley’s immigrant culture — noting that a language other than English is spoken in half of Silicon Valley households and half of companies have a first-generation immigrant founder or co-founder.
“The Valley wouldn’t be here, we wouldn’t be doing any of this if we didn’t have the amazing flow of immigrants that we’ve had in the last 80 years,” Andreessen said. “And the idea of choking that off just makes me sick to my stomach.”
That appears to be a reference to Trump’s immigration policy and the Republican’s renewed calls to ban Muslim immigration in the wake of the Orlando terror attack. The shooter, Omar Mateen, who killed 49 people at a gay nightclub in Orlando Sunday morning, was born in New York to Afghan immigrants.
While noting that “neither party is great” across all the areas the tech community cares passionately about, Andreessen added, “I think clearly, one of the candidates is way better than the other, interestingly on all four, and so to me, it seems like it’s a fairly obvious choice.”
Andreessen’s remarks were also cataloged by The Washington Post, which added his name to their list of “big-name Republicans in Hillary Clinton’s corner.”
It’s comforting that some Republicans are being so rational when their party has been corrupted by a sociopath, and I hope this trend continues and starts to seep into the general American populous soon enough.
(Photo by Forbes)