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“Too Quiet for Comfort”: Did Silicon Valley Botch the Recall?

Fundraisers and donors across the tech industry agree that Silicon Valley has underinvested in the recall—perhaps to Gavin Newsom’s peril.

Chamath Palihapitiya at TechCrunch Disrupt 2013
Photo by Brian Ach/Getty Images for TechCrunch
Theodore Schleifer
September 2, 2021

When I last wrote about the rift in Silicon Valley over recalling Gavin Newsom, I predicted that the campaign would be a frivolous late-summer distraction, enabled by the toxic cocktail of a bored post-Trump media, a healthy dose of G.O.P. hubris, and the occasionally irresistible instinct of the Republic of California to lurch for the recall button. So let me begin this column with a big-hearted, old-fashioned, Mark Zuckerberg-style mea culpa: I promise to do better, Senator.