Tech billionaire Peter Thiel, one of former President Trump’s largest donors, said on Thursday that he would not give any money to Trump this election but may still vote for him.
“If I was put at gunpoint, I would vote for Trump,” Thiel said. interview “I’m not going to be donating any money to his super PAC,” he said onstage at the Aspen Ideas Festival.
Thiel donated $1.25 million to Trump in 2016 and was one of his strongest supporters among business and technology leaders. During the 2022 election cycle, he has spent more than $30 million supporting Republicans.
Thiel, an early investor in Facebook and co-founder of Palantir, has developed a distaste for Trump since the 2022 election, in which candidates he supported faced mixed results: Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio) won, while Arizona’s Blake Masters lost.
Last year, Thiel said the Trump administration was “crazier” and “dangerous” than he expected.
“Voting for Trump was like a rather inarticulate cry for help,” he said. “There are many things I did wrong.”
