There has been a trend in the media recently of “outing” employees and even CEOs of various tech giants for their political preferences.
These are identified by donations given to presidential hopefuls as the race for the US 2020 elections is heating up.
The trend seems to show that the media, just like many ordinary people, think Big Tech companies may have undue influence on the political process – which would make finding out whom their employees and executives support newsworthy.
And after we learned that Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey made a maximum allowed donation to Tulsi Gabbard’s campaign after her participation in a Democratic debate – it’s now time to find out who Google employees throw their monetary support behind.
No surprise perhaps, they’re also Democrats – although very different ones. According to Vox most Googlers like to give their donation money to Elizabeth Warren, Pete Buttigieg, and Bernie Sanders.
What is surprising is these candidates’ stance on Google itself: both Warren and Sanders would like to see the giant broken up into smaller parts.
The article implies that after receiving “beautiful offices” and average salaries of a quarter-million dollars from their employer – these Googlers would now like to also see the company to exhibit “more ethical” behavior.
Most of those who spoke for the article are engineers, and they think spinning off parts of Google would be good for the company and for the competition. There’s also a whiff of nostalgia for the positive way in which Google was perceived in its early, start-up days.
Vox-owned Recode came up with its conclusion that Googlers support Warren more than other candidates by going through Federal Election Commission reports for the first half of this year. The article said that the report showed Warren received $87,000 in donations from Google employees, while Pete Buttigieg – also critical of the company they work for, but not in favor of breaking it up – got $73,300.
In third place is Bernie Sanders who received donations worth $58,000 – and who is quoted as saying he would “absolutely consider” breaking the likes of Google up.
Meanwhile, President Donald Trump’s reelection campaign received only $5,600 from Googlers.
