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IPFS News Link • Voting and Elections

Investor Peter Thiel Will Be a California Delegate for Trump

• http://www.wired.com

Billionaire investor and Facebook board member Peter Thiel has never shied away from contrarian ideas. He thinks kids should drop out of college to launch a startup. He's backed efforts to build floating cities in international waters.

But in the liberal bastion that is San Francisco, Thiel's latest move may be the most daring yet: Thiel is going to be a California delegate for Donald Trump.

On Monday, Trump filed his slate of delegates for California, and right there on the list for Trump's 12th Congressional District picks is Peter Thiel.

That Thiel would support any Republican candidate is not all that surprising. In 2012, he was a major backer for Ron Paul, and last summer, he donated $2 million to Carly Fiorina's Super PAC. In the techtopia of Silicon Valley, Thiel is certainly not alone in his libertarian beliefs.

And yet, Trump is a different kind of candidate. He has become a particularly divisive figure among tech elites, particularly for his stance on immigration. In recent years, tech leaders like Mark Zuckerberg have emerged as some of the most outspoken advocates and lobbyists for immigration reform. During Facebook's recent F8 conference, Zuckerberg alluded to Trump, saying, "I hear fearful voices calling for building walls. Instead of building walls, we can help people build bridges."

Trump has proposed other policies that would likely shock Silicon Valley's system, too, like his insistence that Apple start to manufacture its iPhones in the United States. Presumably, that would apply to other tech manufacturers, as well. And that goes without mentioning the many times Trump has said he's in favor of "closing that internet up" — whatever that means.


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