253
Y Combinator CEO Garry Tan launches dark-money group to influence California politics
(missionlocal.org)
Add him to The List
this post was submitted on 12 Feb 2026
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I feel out of touch. I have no idea what ycombinator is. I’ve always thought it was just a spam website and ignored it!
I also didn't know what it was when I discovered their forum, which is a combination of kool-aid addled VCbrains and tech geeks having normal, informed conversations about tech stuff. I was hanging out there for a while, until I realized.
Cool. I was just thinking the other day that there's not quite enough of a tech billionaire voice in American politics. It's your time to be heard bruh!!
announced Wednesday he had spun up a dark-money group
That's the state of american politics, that people just "announce" that they're starting a dark-money group to influence public policy...
Like, didn't dark money used to be a dirty secret? It wasn't even that long ago. Crazy...
Well it isn't called dark for it's racial diversity...
But the operation is also a media venture: Garry’s List started with a blog pillorying public-sector unions as “special interests,” attacking the ongoing teachers’ strike, and denouncing the proposed billionaire tax.
That's all I need to know this guy is a piece of shit.
For years, Tan has called on tech executives to create “parallel” media and “replace the unelected parts of the system,” like unions and nonprofits. “We need our own machine,” he said in 2023.
Sorry, I meant a really really really really really BIG big piece of shit.
Unions and non-profits are as much "unelected part of our system" as private companies are, is he proposing to regulate those too? Of course not, what a piece of shit.
He also talks about the current Twitter being parallel media. And how that’s a good thing for furthering his agenda of tech ceos taking control of society.
Smart fella. Wait, no, I meant fart smella.
Another well balanced individual throwing money around to change the world to the way they see fit. Surely this will lead to a beautiful utopia this time.
This is the 2nd time I read a piece on Y Combinator.
First one was about a brother team that was "accepted" into the incubator for their company.
They make war drones. Lovely.
All this corporate lobbying and bribes says there's more money in corruption than innovation and competition.
Its how you know your democracy is dead and your economy is a zombie.
As a CEO it is easy to compete when your competition is suffering from tariffs and all you're suffering from is sore knees and a bad taste in your mouth.
What, ol' Micky-Ds spluge not to your liking? 😉🤢🤮💭
Based on the press, I'd say inventing an award and making a small gold trinket gift will cover you for at least a year.
That's how we know that Tim Apple's knees are not as sturdy as some of the other CEOs
Hmm, I wonder what type of politicians the billionaire is advocating for...
He once tweeted that seven of the city’s supervisors — all progressives — should “die slow motherfuckers”
I'm shocked.
Remember when Ron Paul's libertarian party threw out one of their members after he made similar comments about Mitt Romney? Tech elites are destroying discourse in front of our very eyes.
"support for common-sense policies and candidates”
So that will be the loudest fascists who have their tongues furthest up the billionaires' arseholes.
Another one? Isn't GrowSF already this?
They've always got more money to spend.
Oligarchy and democracy are fundamentally incompatible.
Cali's economy is bigger than the UK, theres a lot of money to be thrown around.
California has far more billionaires than any other state by a large margin. According to Wiki, at under 200, the UK has fewer billionaires than California.
Kind of a useless measure compared to billionaires per gdp or billionaires per capita. "Places with more money have people with more money"
Theres a similar group funded by billionaire Anschultz in Colorado, "Advance Colorado" and related groups.