Ron Conway, founder of SV Angel, speaks during the TechCrunch Disrupt NYC 2015 conference in New York on May 4, 2015.
Days after suggesting that President Donald Trump should send federal troops to San Francisco, Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff is facing some consequences.
Prominent startup investor Ron Conway, who backed companies including Google , Airbnb and Stripe, resigned from the board of the Salesforce Foundation on Thursday, CNBC has confirmed. Conway is a longtime Democratic donor who was a member of VCs for Kamala, and donated around $500,000 to at least two funds tied to Kamala Harris' unsuccessful 2024 election campaign.
The New York Times was first to report on Conway's departure from the Salesforce Foundation. A Salesforce spokesperson confirmed his exit in an e-mailed statement.
"We have deep gratitude for Ron Conway and his incredible contributions to the Salesforce Foundation Board for over a decade," the spokesperson said, noting that the group has donated, "$250 million to public schools and education nonprofits to advance opportunity and access for young people, including $30 million announced this week."
The Trump administration recently deployed the National Guard to Portland, Oregon and Chicago, sparking protests and lawsuits and resulting in citizens and immigrants being detained without legal representation.
In a story published late last week in the New York Times, Benioff indicated that he would welcome troops to San Francisco, home to Salesforce. The company's annual Dreamforce conference began in downtown San Francisco on Tuesday.
"We don't have enough cops, so if they can be cops, I'm all for it," Benioff told the Times.
Benioff later appeared to walk back his comments, writing on X that safety is "first and foremost, the responsibility of our city and state leaders." However, by that point Tesla CEO Elon Musk and other right-wing figures had seized on his original comments, amplifying them to their audiences.
Musk, who has drawn criticism for his personal drug use, characterized downtown San Francisco as a "drug zombie apocalypse." And on Wednesday, Trump called San Francisco "a mess," and suggested possibly sending in the National Guard.
... continue reading