Silicon Valley bigwigs like Marc Andreessen and Elon Musk have 100 million reasons to back Trump

An unrealized capital-gains tax may have been the final straw that turned many of Silicon Valley's biggest names into Trump donors.

Jack Raines

7/18/24 2:14PM

Over the last two election cycles, the number of Trump supporters in Silicon Valley not named “Peter Thiel” was approximately zero. According to Vox, Bay Area residents donated $163 million and $199 million to democrats in 2016 and 2020 respectively, dwarfing the $22 million raised for Trump in 2020.

This year, however, there has been a change of tune among many of Silicon Valley’s biggest names. Palantir co-founder Joe Lonsdale, the Winklevoss twins, Sequoia partner Shaun Maguire, Valor Equity founder Antonio Gracias, Tesla CEO Elon Musk, and a16z founders Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz have all reportedly donated or are planning to donate to the Trump campaign.

Andreessen gave some clues as to why we’ve seen this shift, per TechCrunch (emphasis ours):

The pair (Andreessen and Horowitz) listed several reasons they believe the Biden administration is stifling startups through overregulation and potentially needless taxation, while Trump would help innovation flourish. Among other things, the co-founders explained that they don’t agree with the current White House plan to “overregulate” artificial intelligence.
“Any limitations we put [on] ourselves are going to disadvantage the U.S. versus the rest of the World,” Andreessen said.
They also discussed Trump’s view on AI at a recent dinner they had with the former president. “What he said to us is, ‘[AI] is very scary, but we absolutely have to win because if we don’t win, China wins,’” Horowitz said. Additionally, Andreessen said that, unlike the Biden administration, Trump’s crypto regulation plan is “a flat-out blanket endorsement of the entire space.”
But Biden’s proposal to tax unrealized capital gains is what Andreessen called “the final straw” that forced him to switch from supporting the current president to voting for Trump. If the unrealized capital gains tax goes into effect, startups may have to pay taxes on valuation increases. (Private companies’ appreciation is not liquid. However, the U.S. government collects tax in dollars.)
“If you’re a venture firm, you’re getting strips of your portfolio pulled away from you every year. You’re out of business,” Andreessen said. “This makes startups completely implausible.”

This last point, in particular, should command a lot of attention. President Biden reintroduced a proposal for a 25% unrealized capital gains tax on households with a net worth greater than $100 million. Many of the biggest names in venture capital, such as Marc Andreessen, are, in fact, worth more than $100 million, and much of their wealth comes from illiquid stakes in private companies, making them especially vulnerable to an unrealized capital gains tax.

Imagine, for example, that you invested $10 million in a startup at a $100 million valuation, and a few years later, that startup raised new funding at a $1 billion valuation. Great! Assuming no dilution, your $10 million investment is now worth $100 million. With a 25% tax on unrealized capital gains, you would owe the government $22 million in taxes on your $90 million gain. But that “gain” is illiquid; good luck selling part of your stake to cover your taxes.

In the public markets, millions of shares of stock change hands each day, giving investors the opportunity to buy and sell as they wish. Private markets don’t have that luxury: those shares are generally locked up (excluding the occasional secondary sale) until the company is acquired or goes public.

An unrealized capital gains tax would wreak havoc on the entire venture ecosystem, so it shouldn’t be a surprise that some of the biggest names in venture capital are now backing Trump: they have 100 million reasons (and counting) to do so.

Max Knoblauch5/29/26

The Trump administration is reportedly planning a 50% made-in-America requirement for USMCA tariff relief

Qualifying for USMCA-related lower tariffs may soon require more US-made vehicle components, according to reporting by The Wall Street Journal.

The Trump administration is reportedly planning to introduce a 50% US content requirement for vehicles covered by the trade pact to receive lower tariffs. The content would be measured by cost, according to the WSJ.

There currently isn’t any US-specific requirement for those lower tariff rates, but in order to receive preferential tariffs, vehicles are must contain at least 75% regional content (components made in North America). Per Reuters reporting, the Trump admin is seeking to raise the regional requirement to 82%.

These reported plans are subject to change as the US negotiates USMCA terms with Mexico over the next few months.

Overall, Tesla will likely have the easiest time qualifying for any stricter requirements. The automaker’s vehicles contained the highest amount of US/Canadian content in 2025, according to American University research. Ford, GM, and Stellantis all scored lower.

Notably: the underlying government data that many domestic content measurements rely on intentionally combines US and Canadian components, so it’s difficult to know exactly how much of any given vehicle is specifically US-made.

Exclusive | Trump Administration Wants Autos Under USMCA to Be at Least 50% Made in America

These reported plans are subject to change as the US negotiates USMCA terms with Mexico over the next few months.

Tom Jones5/29/26

The $640,000 Luce makes the average Ferrari look like a bargain

Put aside the shape; put aside the smoothing out of Ferrari’s iconic sharp edges; put aside, even, the calls from former Chairman and President Luca Cordero di Montezemolo to “take the Prancing Horse off.” On the grounds of price alone, Luce detractors might have a point.

By now, many of us will have read the criticisms of Ferrari’s first fully electric vehicle, as the Luce — which was unveiled to the world earlier this week and promptly saw the company’s shares crash out in New York and Milan — gets subtly shaded by competitors online and not-so-subtly shaded by basically everyone else.

What makes all of this worse for Ferrari is that, even by the luxury car maker’s notoriously high standards, they’ve slapped a pretty hefty price tag on the Luce, and the company’s CEO, Benedetto Vigna, has already been forced to defend the €550,000 ($640,000) price point, saying yesterday that it’s “fair to pay for innovation,” per Reuters.

While Ferrari’s cars have been getting more expensive of late, as recently as 2022, Ferrari’s average revenue per car sold was around $340,000. At nearly twice that price, this new electric model is obviously proving a little much (visually, conceptually, and financially) for many loyal and long-standing fans of the Prancing Horse to stomach.