Silicon Valley Entrepreneur Of Sri Lankan Origin Chamath Palihapitiya To Run As Governor Of California

Chamath Palihapitiya, the famous Silicon Valley entrepreneur of Sri Lankan origin, has expressed his interest to run as governor of California.

“It’s on,” Palihapitiya tweeted late Monday night, adding the hashtag #RecallGavinNewsom. The tweet linked to a website, “chamathforca.com” which was titled “Chamath for California Governor," formally launching his campaign.

“California is a mess — it’s too expensive, our teachers are underpaid, and our schools aren’t good enough” was the provocative tagline.

California’s difficulties in dealing with the Covid pandemic and the wildfires that threaten residents in Northern California, along with its high costs and taxes, have led to a lot of grumbling among its citizens — and an exodus of Palihapitiya’s cohorts in the tech and investment world. These include people like Elon Musk, who is relocating himself and his Tesla electric car company to Texas.

The entrepreneur’s announcement quickly got 15.4 thousand likes. Among those applauding him was SkyBridge co-founder Anthony Scaramucci, the former Trump official and now Republican Party gadfly, who gave it the “on fire” emoji.

Palihapitiya is an early Facebook Inc executive and minority owner of the Golden State Warriors basketball team. Palihapitiya has launched several special purpose acquisition companies (SPACs) and merged them with the likes of space tourism company Virgin Galactic and home-selling platform Opendoor Technologies Inc. (With inputs from Reuters and Institutional Investor)