Senator J.D. Vance, Donald Trump’s running mate in the November presidential election, has past ties to tech, but also strong opinions about it.
Informed by the knowledge of the industry many politicians lack, Vance is anti-Big Tech monopolies, and positive on cryptocurrencies.
Appearing on the CBS News show Face the Nation, the potential future vice president reiterated his previously stated by-and-large approval of FTC Commissioner Lina Kahn’s work, and the two seem to be particularly in agreement on the need to break up Big Tech monopolies.
The case for spinning off companies like Google has been talked up over the last years from both political camps in the US, unsurprisingly, however, from different angles. Vance focuses on the danger of such large entities controlling speech.
“I don’t want Google or a billionaire that controls Google that’s in bed with China to be able to censor American information and that’s exactly what they’ve done,” Vance told CBS.
He also mentioned the anti-trust lawsuit against Google launched during Trump’s first term in office, noting that they both “look at this in the same way.”
Speaking of the difference between “Small Tech” and “Big Tech,” Vance singled out the monopolistic power the latter has to control some key elements, such as Google’s digital advertising power vs. for example X.
“I don’t think that Elon Musk has any monopoly – he’s not using his company to try to destroy competitors,” Vance remarked, explaining the importance of anti-trust initiatives around the technology sector.
In pushing for better anti-monopoly rules, Vance hopes the Trump presidency would achieve two goals: secure better-paid jobs at home, and freedom of expression.
This is not the first time that Vance has criticized Google, but also Facebook and others for their left-leaning bias, posting on X in February that it was “time to break Google up.”
As for cryptocurrencies, Vance, like Trump, wants to avoid overindulgent regulatory measures. Also earlier this year, he criticized the approach taken by Securities and Exchange Commission Chair Gary Gensler during a Y Combinator event RemedyFest.
Some reports see these policy points as appealing to a number of Silicon Valley actors, which, after all, isn’t uniformly left – although its biggest players seem to be.
But Vance’s messages, particularly around cryptocurrencies, seem to resonate among venture capitalists and the likes of Elon Musk, who are willing to put their money where their mouth is and support the Trump-Vance ticket with large campaign contributions.
