145 tech leaders sign open letter -- Donald Trump is a 'disaster for innovation'
A large number of high-profile leaders in the tech community have signed a letter against presidential candidate Donald Trump.
The petition includes the names of 145 people who are against Trump's policies including big names such as Slack CEO and co-founder Stewart Butterfield, IAC Chairman Barry Diller, Tumblr founder David Karp, Twitter co-founder Ev Williams and the co-founder of Apple, Steve Wozniak.
The impassioned plea to keep Trump out of power was written by Katie Stanton, the CMO of Color Genomics and the former VP of global media for Twitter. It is a powerful message to America from some of the most powerful people in the world.
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The letter takes aim at Trump's right-wing policies, writing that he stands against open innovation, movement of people and engagement with the world outside America.
"We believe in an inclusive country that fosters opportunity, creativity and a level playing field. Donald Trump does not," the letter reads.
"He campaigns on anger, bigotry, fear of new ideas and new people, and a fundamental belief that America is weak and in decline. We have listened to Donald Trump over the past year and we have concluded: Trump would be a disaster for innovation."
Just a day out from when Trump's vice president is expected to be announced, the letter slams his controversial views on everything from immigration to Internet regulation.
"Donald Trump, meanwhile, traffics in ethnic and racial stereotypes, repeatedly insults women, and is openly hostile to immigration. He has promised a wall, mass deportations, and profiling," the letter continued.
"Donald Trump proposes 'shutting down' parts of the Internet as a security strategy — demonstrating both poor judgment and ignorance about how technology works."
It ends with a disclaimer stating that all the individuals listed are not representing the companies they work for.
It is worth noting a lot of prominent people are not on the list. There are no signatories from Google or Apple, and some of the biggest names in tech -- Elon Musk, Tim Cook, Mark Zuckerberg and Jack Dorsey -- did not sign on.
Of course, there is no Peter Thiel
Read the full letter here.
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Topics Donald Trump Elections
Jenni Ryall is Mashable's VP of Content Strategy. She spends her time launching cool, new things such as Mashable Deals and Mashable Reels. On the other days, she is developing strong partnerships with companies including Apple News, Flipboard, Snapchat, Facebook, Twitter and Reddit.
