Source: TechCrunch, Translated by: 0xxz@Golden Finance
Marc Andreessen, co-founder of Silicon Valley's best-known venture capital firm a16z, said he has been a Democrat for most of his life. He said he supported and voted for Bill Clinton, Al Gore, John Kerry, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.
However, he says he is no longer loyal to the Democratic Party. He supported and voted for former President Donald Trump in the 2024 presidential race. His reason for choosing Trump over President Joe Biden mainly comes down to one main issue - he believes Trump's policies are more favorable for tech, especially for the startup ecosystem.
Anderson explained his reasoning and how the two presidential candidates’ plans compare on the latest episode of “The Ben & Marc Show,” a podcast he co-hosts with a16z co-founder Ben Horowitz.
“I wish we didn’t have to choose sides,” said Horowitz, who acknowledged that his political choice would upset many of his friends and even his mother. “We do believe that the future of our business, the future of technology and the future of America are at stake.”
Technological strength was the biggest pillar that helped the United States defeat the Soviet Union
Andreessen and Horowitz believe that technological prowess is one of the three pillars that have made the United States the most successful country in the world over the past century, along with economic and military prowess. The United States’ dominance in these three areas helped it peacefully defeat one of the greatest threats of the 20th century, the Soviet Union. The a16z co-founder said that the Soviet Union ended the Cold War because it could not keep up with the United States technologically.
“Why is technology so important? Because if you don’t have the technology part of this triangle, you don’t have the economic part and you don’t have the military part,” Andreessen said.
The two cited several reasons why they believe the Biden administration has stifled startups through excessive regulation and potentially unnecessary taxes, while the Trump administration would help innovation flourish.
Biden administration 'over-regulates' AI
Among other things, the co-founders explained that they disagree with the White House’s current plans to “overregulate” AI.
“Any restrictions we impose on ourselves put the United States at a disadvantage relative to the rest of the world,” Andreessen said.
They also discussed Trump’s views on AI during a recent dinner with the former president. “He said to us, ‘AI is very scary, but we absolutely have to win, because if we don’t win, China will win,’ ” Horowitz said.
Additionally, Andreessen said that unlike the Biden administration, Trump’s crypto regulatory plan is a “broad endorsement of the entire space.”
Taxing unrealized capital gains: The final straw
But Biden’s proposal to tax unrealized capital gains was what Andreessen called “the final straw” that forced him to switch from supporting the incumbent president to voting for Trump. If the unrealized capital gains tax goes into effect, startups may have to pay taxes on valuation increases. (The value added of private companies is not liquid. However, the U.S. government taxes it in dollars.)
“If you’re a venture capital firm, every year your portfolio gets pulled out. You go bankrupt,” Andreessen said. “It makes it completely unviable for startups.”
Andreessen has been outspoken in the past about the importance of technology to society. Last October, he published a "Techno-Optimist Manifesto" calling on technologists to ignore critics and pessimists and embrace technology as the "only eternal source of growth." The 15-year-old firm is one of the largest venture capital firms in Silicon Valley, with more than $42 billion in assets under management, according to PitchBook.