Ben Horowitz’s Backing of Trump and Harris Unveils Silicon Valley AI Politics

The prominent venture capitalist communicated to the Andreessen Horowitz team that he has personal support for Harris, while also expressing the view that Trump is less inclined to impose regulations on AI startups.

Ben Horowitz, a venture investor and partner at the powerful Andreessen Horowitz, says he personally backs Kamala Harris. Horowitz and his partner Marc Andreessen surprised some people this summer when they said the firm would still support Trump. In a memo to his firm’s workers last week, he said he plans to donate to the Harris campaign. They said at the time that the Biden Administration’s tech policies were bad for tech startups, especially those in crypto and AI, and that they think a second term for Trump would be best for what they call “little tech startups,” which they say they support.

Why Andreessen Horowitz Favors Trump for AI Startups

It’s amazing to see famous tech billionaires like Andreessen and Horowitz moving towards the MAGA right in Silicon Valley, which has a history of being left. However, it looks like their support for Trump is limited and based on a deal, almost like a “quid pro quo.” The partners at Andreessen Horowitz met with the Trump campaign several times before announcing plans to donate to a Trump super PAC. They were sure that Trump would regulate new technologies with little oversight. Like Biden’s October 2023 AI executive order, which, among other things, gave AI companies non-binding safety standards, Trump has promised to undo it.

Horowitz says he has now met with Harris and her team, but he doesn’t have a clear picture of how she might protect AI companies if she were in charge. It’s likely that Harris would keep Biden’s plan and make it even better. In May 2023, Harris got together with the heads of Microsoft, Anthropic, OpenAI, and Google. Those companies and others promised to follow the EO’s rules for safety and openness.

Horowitz said in a blog post in December of last year that his firm is not biased and will back candidates who believe in  an “optimistic technology-enabled future.” It also means that the company is ready to ignore the possible political, social, economic, and environmental risks of another Trump term in this year’s election.

This way of thinking might be partly due to the high risk and high payoff of the AI technology shift that is just starting. Creating and using AI models is a very expensive business that asks investors for checks that are bigger than ever before. OpenAI just raised an extra $6.6 billion, bringing its total funding to $13 billion. More funding rounds are sure to come.

It turns out that the AI revolution that began with ChatGPT isn’t going to change the world quickly. Many AI companies will have to wait a long time to start making money. For example, OpenAI says it will start making money in 2029. Because of this, tech investors may be even less tolerant of new government rules and politicians who back them when it comes to AI than normal. It’s just seen as adding to the risks that are already very high.

California’s AI Bill: A Legislative Battle for Big Tech

Think about how strongly the industry fought against California’s AI bill, which wanted to make sure that big-edge models followed safety rules. The bill received a lot of support from the people and was passed by the state assembly, but Governor Gavin Newsom vetoed it because of strong lobbying pressure.

The tech industry is betting that creative AI will change the way all levels of business are run. To do that, the AI needs to take in all of the organization’s data, which includes all of its knowledge and experience, and then give it to workers through apps, robots, or copilots. But big language models still sometimes mix up facts, which is a big problem for businesses like hospitals and banks.

That issue is seen as a chance by a new company started by former Apple and Google executives. This week, the company called Infactory said it had raised $4 million in a seed round valued at $25 million from Andreessen Horowitz and others. The money will be used to build out its business search and fact-checking AI platform, which the company plans to launch later this year with partners.