(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Billionaire thinks he's bought Harris, lock, stock and barrel [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.'] Date: 2024-07-26 The battle against corruption never ends... www.levernews.com/… , www.thebignewsletter.com/… Reid Hoffman, billionaire, founder of LinkedIn, board member of Microsoft, (after selling LinkedIn to Microsoft for $26+ billion dollars) and a cofounder of Inflection AI, through his venture capital fund, Greylock. Microsoft is currently under scrutiny from the FTC for its acquisition of Inflection AI. In addition to his business activities, Hoffman is also a donor to PACs supporting Democratic candidates in this election cycle, including a $6 million donation to the super PAC, Future Forward, that was supporting Biden’s bid for a second term. He also donated directly to the Biden/Harris campaign war chest in January to the tune of $923,000, bringing his total, so far, to $1.7 million. He’s now turned to supporting Harris. Harris has not yet detailed her plans for antitrust enforcement or consumer protection, and her record as California attorney general is mixed on reining in anticompetitive business practices. On Wednesday, The New York Times reported that while Harris “remains a bit of an enigma in the business world,” one of her donors said she had privately “expressed skepticism of Ms. Khan’s expansive view of antitrust powers.” The same day, Reid Hoffman, the billionaire LinkedIn founder and powerful venture capitalist, appeared on CNN to praise Harris’ record on business and told the network that Khan should be fired. Harris is reportedly planning a Silicon Valley fundraising drive alongside Hoffman in coming months. Hoffman helped push Netflix co-founder Reed Hastings, who has donated more than $20 million to the Democratic Party in recent years, to send Harris’ presidential campaign $7 million on Tuesday — Hastings’ single largest donation to any candidate. Hoffman is one of many of Harris’ Silicon Valley allies who are on track to raise over $100 million for Harris’ campaign. During his CNN appearance, Hoffman talked up Harris’s business credentials, saying “Vice President Harris is much more of the pro-business candidate than Trump and Vance,” and said Khan was “waging war on American business.” Bernie Sanders has called Hoffman’s comments on Khan, “not acceptable” and Elizabeth Warren, who has called for breaking up Big Tech companies, also issued a statement supporting Khan. Matt Stoller reports that: A few days ago, billionaire LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman gave $10 million to the Kamala Harris effort, and promised a lot more. Hoffman is a Silicon Valley titan, part of the “PayPal mafia” that includes Peter Thiel and Elon Musk, though Hoffman sits on the Democratic side of the aisle. This morning, Hoffman went on CNN and issued demands. Harris must end Biden’s tariff and antitrust regimes, he said, and fire Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina Khan. Ok, so it’s pretty stunning for an oligarch like Hoffman, with a net worth of a couple billion dollars, to publicly make such a demand. So why is he doing it? One reason is that there’s a lot of money involved. As the Lever reported, Hoffman is on the board of Microsoft, which is right now being sued and investigated by the FTC. It’s a pretty good gig, if you get to fire the law enforcer investigating your misdeeds. www.cnn.com/... From the Lever: [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2024/7/26/2258228/-Billionaire-thinks-he-s-bought-Harris-lock-stock-and-barrel?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=trending&pm_medium=web Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/