Silicon Valley tech companies make strides to encourage voter turnout in November
And for many Silicon Valley techies there will be no excuses — such as a pesky job to report to — to keep them from the polls this year.
As part of a growing push to drive more California voters to the polls, tech startups are launching voter registration campaigns, partnering on voter turnout initiatives and even pledging to give employees the day off on Nov. 8, according to an article this week in the San Jose Mercury news.
The article notes that many 'valley techies' will have no excuses for not voting like a job or other reasons not to go to the polls. In fact, the article notes that Google added voter registration information on its main website along with Airbnb which celebrated its anniversary as a company by urging visitors to vote. The article continues to note that Airbnb, Lyft and Salesforce have partnered with the TurboVote Challenge to help the U.S. reach 80 per cent voter turn out by 2020.
Further, many tech startups are urging their employees to skip work on election day, Bloomberg reported.
Companies that have joined the Take off Election Day campaign include Twilio, TaskRabbit, Survey Monkey, Square, Spotify and DoorDash. Venture capital firms, including Cowboy Ventures and August Capital, also have made the pledge. VC Hunter Walk has been leading the campaign. Yuri Sagalov, co-founder and CEO of Palo Alto-based file-syncing platform AeroFS and part-time Y Combinator partner, voiced his support Monday in a blog post.
“Startup founders and tech execs, make it easy for your employees to exercise their rights,” he wrote. “Add your name to the list. Give them the day off.”
The push could be a boon for Democrats, the article suggests as many Silicon Valley tech leaders have been very vocal about their dislike of Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump. Case in point — an open anti-Trump letter signed by dozens of Silicon Valley’s prominent tech CEOs and VCs.
The tech companies are making the right moves as in the US voter turnout is at just 54 per cent of eligible voters casting ballots during the 2012 presidential election, according to the Pew Research Center, the US lags behind its peers in voter turnout — landing 31st among 35 developed countries studied.