Microsoft and its founder, Bill Gates, went all out for Democrat presidential candidate Kamala Harris, as President-elect Donald Trump has chosen candidates who will take a tough stance on big tech, especially big tech’s censorship practices. For.
At the end of October, new York Times Bill Gates said he donated nearly $50 million to Future Forward USA Action, a “dark money” political action group that was supporting Vice President Kamala Harris’ presidential bid, reports said. Future Forward was one of the leading Democrat organizations to push anti-Trump ads during the 2024 presidential election.
Although Gates did not explicitly endorse Harris, he claimed that “this election is different.” he told new York Times:
I support candidates who demonstrate a clear commitment to improving health care, reducing poverty, and fighting climate change in America and around the world. “I have a long history of working with leaders across the political spectrum, but this election is different, with unprecedented importance for Americans and the most vulnerable around the world.
Times Wrote that Gates has tried to stay above political battles so that he can work with Democrat and Republican administrations.
However, it appears that his organization has become increasingly aligned with the Democrat Party and its presidential candidates.
Microsoft Chairman Brad Smith and his wife Kathy Surace-Smith hosted a $5,000 fundraiser in 2023, with contributions going to the Biden Victory Fund. Smith was the top fundraiser for Democrats during Biden’s first term.
The big tech company has hired several people who have later sparked controversy with the 45th President.
Christopher Krebs, a cybersecurity policy executive for Microsoft, went on to serve as director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA).
Krebs claimed that the 2020 presidential election was one of the most secure in terms of internet security and technology.
During a Senate hearing in December 2020, Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) criticized Krebs, saying:
If you are saying that this is the most secure election, based on the fact that no dead person voted, no non-citizen voted, no person broke absentee rules, then I think that is wrong. There is, and I think a lot of people on our side are worried about this. Your statement is being interpreted to mean, ‘Oh, there was no problem in the elections.’
“I don’t think you’ve investigated any of the problems you heard about here. “So really you’re just referring to something different – the way I see it,” the Kentucky senator said.
Meanwhile, in the final stretch of the Biden administration, the Federal Trade Commission launched a sweeping antitrust probe.
Microsoft also accused Google of running a shadow campaign against them.
President-elect Donald Trump said Friday that Gates had asked to visit his Mar-a-Lago estate.
Now, the Trump administration may take a different stance, and work to counter censorship and other anti-competitive behavior by big tech.
“Big Tech, and now Microsoft, are working hard to rehabilitate their image in front of MAGA and President Trump, hoping we don’t remember that they not only funded the enemy, but worked for the enemy. and continued to censor and block conservative views. ,” a source familiar with the Trump administration’s thinking told Breitbart News.
In early December Trump chose Gail Slater, an antitrust veteran and economic adviser to J.D. Vance, to lead the Justice Department’s antitrust division.
He is expected to continue the department’s crackdown on big tech, including those brought in during Trump’s first term in office, the outlets reported.
Trump said Slater would “ensure that our competition laws are strictly and fairly enforced, with clear rules that facilitate rather than stifle the talent of our greatest companies.”
Trump also appointed Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Commissioner Andrew Ferguson to lead the antitrust agency.
In mid-December Ferguson urged the FTC to investigate “unlawful collusion” among large tech platforms and called for a halt to advertiser boycotts, which he believes harms competition.
She reiterated Commissioner Melissa Holyoak’s proposal to revive Trump’s first-term Executive Order 13925 to promote transparency regarding big tech’s content moderation and censorship practices.
He wrote:
We must specifically address not only the censorship conduct, but also examine the structural issues that may have given these platforms their power over the lives and speech of Americans in the first place. In particular, we must vigorously enforce antitrust laws against all platforms that unlawfully limit Americans’ ability to freely and openly exchange ideas. We must prosecute any unlawful collusion between online platforms, and combat advertiser boycotts that jeopardize competition between those platforms.
“Censorship, even when done transparently and honestly, is harmful to American democracy. Ferguson further said, the Commission must use the full extent of its authority to protect the freedom of speech of all Americans.
“That authority includes the power to investigate collusion that could stifle competition and, in doing so, suppress free speech online. We should get such an investigation done. And if our investigations uncover anti-competitive cartels that facilitate or promote censorship, we must expose them.
Trump nominated Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Commissioner Brendan Carr to lead the agency. Carr has called for big tech platforms to dismantle the “censorship cartel”, saying that American democracy depends on it. Carr says the Tech Masters of the Universe have teamed up with “Orwellian-named newsguards,” fact-checking groups and advertising agencies to enforce a “one-sided narrative.”
Microsoft has partnered with NewsGuard, whose co-founder suggested the 2020 Hunter Biden laptop exposé was a “hoax perpetrated by the Russians.”
Sean Moran is a policy reporter for Breitbart News. follow him on x @SeanMoran3,
