Leading technology companies — around 100 of them — filed an amicus brief over the weekend, lodging their opposition to Trump’s executive order to cut off immigration from seven Muslim majorities countries. The signatories include titans like Google and Facebook, IPO candidates Airbnb and Uber, retailers Warby Parker and Levi Strauss (aligned with the others by regional home if not product), and many others. It is close enough to a comprehensive list that the absences are notable (check out Quartz’s tally).
Yes, money is part of the motivation here. But that’s true in most matters of politics. And the companies are taking some level of risk in speaking out against the interests of a president who has been known to target individual corporations on Twitter (Jack Dorsey’s firm did join the brief, by the way). I’m proud of the industry for speaking up for their workers, and the principles that have made so much economic growth possible.
Excepts:
“The Order represents a significant departure from the principles of fairness and predictability that have governed the immigration system of the United States for more than fifty years …The Order makes it more difficult and expensive for U.S. companies to recruit, hire, and retain some of the world’s best employees. It disrupts ongoing business operations… Long-term, this instability [caused by the executive order] will make it far more difficult and expensive for U.S. companies to hire the world’s best talent—and impede them from competing in the global marketplace.”
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