The politicisation of Silicon Valley
An interview with Nick Clegg throughout the South by SouthWest (SXSW) 2026 present in London for The Relaxation is Cash podcast is illustrative of simply how out of contact the tech giants are.
Chatting with ITV political editor Robert Peston, the previous UK deputy prime minister spoke in regards to the politicisation of Silicon Valley – and the truth that nobody else had any expertise in politics.
Current on the inauguration of Donald Trump in 2025 had been Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Apple boss Tim Prepare dinner, Google CEO Sundar Pichai, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, and Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella. Additionally current was SpaceX and Tesla boss Elon Musk, who went on to move up the US Division of Authorities Effectivity, which oversaw the closure of and funding cuts to quite a few US authorities departments and programmes.
Wanting on the tech sector’s perspective to the brand new administration, Clegg stated: “Reasonably than shun politics, they’ve determined to embrace Maga [make America great again] politics for an entire bunch of causes.”
Dell is the latest firm to learn from its CEO’s open help of the US president. In 2025, after Trump received the US presidential election, Dell CEO Michael Dell tweeted: “Congratulations to President Trump on a profitable marketing campaign and election win. We stay up for continued progress and alternative underneath his management and dealing collectively towards a robust and unified future for all.”
In Might 2026, Dell received a $9.7bn contract with the Pentagon, described by the US Division of Battle’s chief info officer, Kirsten Davies, as a “second-generation blanket buy settlement” to streamline and consolidate vital Microsoft software program and providers throughout the division, the intelligence group and the US Coast Guard.
With Trump’s newest government order of two June, which goals to advertise superior synthetic intelligence (AI) within the US, questions are being raised over how a lot the tech giants supporting the US administration will profit from their closeness to the president.
Political shift in Silicon Valley
Clegg joined Meta, the proprietor of Fb, WhatsApp and Instagram, in 2018 and left in 2025. “Once I arrived in Silicon Valley within the autumn of 2018, it was a totally totally different time. Silicon Valley was nonetheless a bit hippy-dippy, very a lot left-leaning, for higher or for worse. However crucially, social media was a social factor. It was about human beings,” he stated.
In 2025, somewhat than shun politics, Clegg stated the entire of Silicon Valley determined to embrace Maga politics. He stated they did this “for an entire bunch of causes – some high-minded and a few extra self-interest”.
Talking about Meta particularly, he stated: “Definitely the product within the firm I work for has modified completely from being a form of human-centric product to 1 which is now a lot, rather more about content material, usually artificial content material, being algorithmically beneficial to you. To place it mildly, it was not precisely the type of factor that appealed to me.”
Threat of political change
Clegg questioned the longevity of the tech giants, provided that they’ve now shifted from being apolitical to being closely supportive of the Trump administration.
“I’m not speaking about my outdated life as a politician as a result of I wasn’t employed at Meta as a politician, however I really don’t assume it’s smart for enterprise to flip-flop each time the political climate modifications in Washington,” he stated.
Clegg stated it was notably troublesome for a social media enterprise like Meta to stability freedom of speech with freedom of expression.
“About one half of the US thinks that corporations like Meta actively censor and suppress their view of the world, and one other half yell at them and say, ‘You’re not censoring sufficient to maintain us protected’,” he stated. “There’s a way more polarised debate, and I feel should you’re coping with one thing as delicate as speech, and the place speech moderation ends and free expression begins, it’s extra smart to chorus from leaping into one political camp or one other.”
From his expertise of working at Meta, Clegg stated: “Silicon Valley is at all times vulnerable to ludicrous hyperbole, which, for higher or for worse, they then go and act upon. They’re not politicians and, oddly sufficient, in conversations, I used to be usually the one one who’d ever been elected to something.”
In keeping with Clegg, Silicon Valley thought-about the Trump victory a paradigm shift. “Every little thing was totally different in comparison with earlier than, and so they wanted to regulate accordingly.” However the political pendulum will ultimately swing the opposite manner and other people’s attitudes will change.
When requested whether or not tech bosses had been pushed purely by cash, Clegg stated he wasn’t positive it was solely about cash, including that they have an inclination to have an undergraduate-level fascination with historical Rome. “Am I going to be remembered in a thousand years’ time as the one who helped inhabit Mars?” he stated, implying that they see themselves as empire-building and need to be recognised for his or her achievements.
“They need to dwell in a world the place nice males – and it’s at all times males – do nice issues, whereas the remainder of us Lilliputian people scurry round within the form of decrease divisions and erect statues, which is able to final for lots of of years.”
Clegg stated this tendency to need to depart a legacy drives their behaviour rather more than having an additional few billion {dollars} in contrast with a competitor.
