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With Vice President Kamala Harris firmly ensconced as the presumptive Democratic nominee<\/a> Silicon Valley is hopeful<\/a> the Bay Area native will be tech and business<\/a> friendly.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cKamala literally comes from this area,\u201d Box<\/a> CEO Aaron Levie told<\/a> Politico. \u201cHer backers have been in tech.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Throughout her political career<\/a>, Harris, who is from Oakland, has worked closely with the tech industry. She was previously the district attorney for San Francisco and then California\u2019s attorney general, both roles which gave her a familiarity with Silicon Valley.\u00a0<\/p>\n In the past Harris has had close ties to former Meta COO Sheryl Sandberg. In 2015, during Harris\u2019 Senate run, the two appeared together<\/a> at an event at Meta\u2019s Menlo Park headquarters. When meeting with Alphabet<\/a> employees in 2010, Harris referred<\/a> to them as \u201cfamily,\u201d citing the fact the company was based in her home state. During her campaigns for California attorney general and U.S. senator, Harris relied on campaign donations from major tech companies. Apple<\/a>, Alphabet, Amazon<\/a>, and Microsoft<\/a> all contributed to Harris\u2019 2020 campaign for president, according to OpenSecrets. Apple and Alphabet also contributed to her 2016 Senate campaign.\u00a0<\/p>\n Even in the early days of her current presidential bid, some of the Silicon Valley support<\/a> continues. Days after Joe Biden endorsed her, Harris got nods of approval from big Democratic donors including Sandberg, Melinda Gates, and LinkedIn<\/a> cofounder Reid Hoffman, who previously backed<\/a> Biden\u2019s campaign. On Tuesday, Netflix<\/a> cofounder Reed Hastings donated $7 million<\/a> to the Harris campaign.\u00a0<\/p>\n But all that hasn\u2019t made Harris shy away from regulating Big Tech during her time in state and national politics. In 2019, as a senator, she backed a California effort<\/a> to give gig workers at companies like Lyft<\/a> and Uber<\/a> additional rights<\/a>, like overtime pay and the right to unionize. The same year she said<\/a> the government should \u201cseriously take a look at breaking up\u201d Meta.\u00a0<\/p>\n That track record seems to have made other big tech industry donors wary<\/a> of backing her unconditionally. Were she to indicate her friendliness to the industry, more donors would support her campaign, Levie told Politico.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cIf by the end of the week she had a tech policy framework out there, a 10-point plan for pro-business, pro-tech, pro-entrepreneurship, and it was credible,\u201d Levie said, \u201cI think she could very quickly rally a significant portion of the ecosystem.\u201d<\/p>\n To Levie, a \u201cpro-tech\u201d Harris agenda includes immigration policies that made it easier to hire skilled talent from abroad and eliminating the administration\u2019s current proposed tax on unrealized capital gains. \u201cWithout unrealized capital gains, you literally don\u2019t have money to invest in equity, in startups,\u201d Levie told<\/a> Fortune<\/em>\u2019s Diane Brady.\u00a0<\/p>\n Under the Biden administration, the Justice Department and Federal Trade Commission have also taken hardline<\/a> approaches to antitrust<\/a>, ensnaring Big Tech\u2019s biggest firms and, in some instances, relying on new definitions<\/a> of what constitutes a monopoly<\/a> to open cases<\/a> against the likes of Amazon and Apple\u00a0<\/p>\n A spokesperson for the Harris campaign declined to comment on the record about Levie\u2019s comments. Box did not respond to a request for comment.\u00a0<\/p>\n As part of her White House duties, Harris led the Biden administration\u2019s early policy work<\/a> on artificial intelligence<\/a>, the current hot button issue in tech. In May 2023, Harris met with CEOs of the top AI firms, including Sam Altman, Satya Nadella, and Sundar Pichai.\u00a0<\/p>\n A few months later Harris made clear she wouldn\u2019t let the world\u2019s leading AI developers off the regulatory hook, just because their tech was cutting-edge. \u201cPresident Biden and I reject the false choice that suggests we can either protect the public or advance innovation,\u201d Harris said<\/a> during a speech in London. \u201cWe can and we must do both.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Even when she was announced as Biden\u2019s VP pick in August 2020, Silicon Valley had high hopes for her role in the White House. \u201cShe grew up around a ton of innovation and realized how important that is for the California economy,\u201d former Oracle<\/a> president Charles Phillip told<\/a> the Wall Street Journal<\/em> in 2020, a few days after she was announced as Biden\u2019s running mate.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Now, as Harris contends for the top job, Silicon Valley hopes that a second bite of the apple with a Democratic candidate will spell more favorable policy for tech. \u201cA lot of people wish the Democratic party would stop shooting themselves in the foot,\u201d Levie told Fortune<\/em>\u2019s Brady.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n