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Elizabeth Warren swears off major donations from Facebook, Google executives

Elizabeth Warren swears off major donations from Facebook, Google executives

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And she wants the other Democrats to do so as well

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Democratic Presidential Candidates Discuss LGBTQ Issues At Human Rights Campaign Foundation Forum
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Elizabeth Warren’s presidential campaign announced on Tuesday that it will no longer take large donations from executives working at big tech companies like Facebook and Google. 

In a Medium post, Warren pledged to refuse any contributions totaling over $200 from executives of big tech companies, banks, private equity firms, and hedge funds. More specifically, her new contribution rules apply to Alphabet, Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Microsoft, Lyft, and Uber, among others. Personal donations are capped at $2,800 when contributing to individual campaigns.

According to The Wall Street Journal, this policy applies to past contributions as well. The campaign will compare the names of individual contributors with leadership teams listed on corporate websites.

Warren announced these new rules ahead of Tuesday’s Democratic debate, and in the blog post, Warren challenged her fellow candidates to be more transparent about their influential donors and any positions their campaigns have given them to mask their contributions.

“I’m proud to be running a grassroots-funded campaign for president, and I hope my fellow candidates for the Democratic nomination will do the same,” Warren said. “But however we choose to fund our campaigns, I think Democratic voters should have a right to know how the possible future leaders of our party are spending their time and who their campaign is rewarding.”

Warren’s move comes shortly after reports highlighted how tech employees have begun to embrace and support Warren’s presidential bid, despite her plans to break up the very companies that they work for. 

The new policy is part of Warren’s broader policy plan to get big money out of politics. Last month, as part of this plan, her campaign announced that, if elected president, Warren would reinstate an old congressional office called the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) to help lawmakers learn about emerging technologies without relying on Google or Facebook lobbyists.