According to a new GovPredict study released Thursday, Apple employees heavily favored Democrats in their contributions for local, state, and federal elections. In all, 91 percent of their political giving went to Democrats, with only 9 percent going to Republicans between 2004 and 2018.
Since 2004, 95.5 percent of contributions by Apple employees to local political action committees (PACs) went to Democrats and only 4.5 percent went to Republicans. Since 2010, 91 percent of Apple employee contributions to state PACs went to Democrats. Since 2014, 100 percent of Apple employee gifts to partisan 527 organizations went to Democrats. Since 2004, 90.5 percent of Apple employee contributions to federal PACs went to Democrats.
GovPredict study screenshot showing Apple political contributions by employees.
Overall, 91 percent of Apple employee political contributions went to Democrats, while only 9 percent went to Republicans.
Among the top seven PACs to receive funds from Apple employees, six are liberal or Democrat. The Democratic National Committee took the lion’s share with $681,123, while the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee took second with $116,972, and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee took $70,041. Emily’s List came next, with $62,925. Only then came the Republican National Committee with $31,778.
Among the top 8 federal candidates to receive money from Apple employees, 5 are Democrats. Hillary Clinton received $1.8 million, while Barack Obama took in $788,350 and Bernie Sanders received $137,961.
Behind these three Democrat presidential candidates came House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.) with $111,000. Then California attorney, attorney general, and then Senator Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) with $78,347. Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) took sixth with $54,400 and Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel took eight with $52,000.
Dominic Rapini, a Republican running for U.S. Senate in Connecticut, was himself an Apple employee, and contributed half of the amount Apple workers paid to his campaign — $52,420 in total.
Donald Trump received $6,786 from Apple employees. This paltry amount was less than the amounts received by state Senator Scott Weiner, the Montana Democratic Party, Jill Stein, and the Franken Recount Fund.
Among presidential candidates, Mitt Romney came fourth after Bernie Sanders, having received $55,920. Then came John Kerry with $48,924. Even Ron Paul managed to score $34,007 from Apple employees. Sens. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Rand Paul (R-Ky.) received about as much as Trump, $8,457 and $5,068 respectively.
This was the third such study from GovPredict. The company first examined the political giving of Alphabet, Google’s parent company, and Amazon. Those studies found similar biases toward liberals and Democrats at Alphabet and Amazon.
GovPredict “identified all the variants of employer name Apple employees have used on campaign filings when making contributions,” including 119 different variations, such as “Apple. IINC,” “Apple Computer Co.,” and “Apple Tech Support.” Then GovPredict looked at all the unique PACs that Apple employees had contributed to, classifying them as Democratic, Republican, or neither.
The liberal culture at big tech companies has been well-documented. Earlier this year, a study found widespread fear among conservative employees at Silicon Valley companies. James Damore, the conservative Google employee who was fired for a document examining the tech gender gap, told PJ Media that conservatives are “in the closet” at Google. A group of conservatives at Facebook have started an effort to change the “political monoculture” there.
Last August, the Christian nonprofit D. James Kennedy Ministries sued Amazon and the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) for defamation and religious discrimination. Tech companies have relied on the far-Left SPLC’s “hate group” designations, which lump in conservative and Christian groups along with the KKK. Amazon exiled D. James Kennedy Ministries from its charity arm, Amazon Smile, because of the SPLC designation.
Last year, Apple publicly partnered with the SPLC, pledging $2 million to the Left-wing smear factory and promising to create an application enabling iPhone users to contribute easily.
Democrats like Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minn.) have called on Amazon to remove all products sold by organizations branded “hate groups” by the SPLC.
After Prager University sued Google for discrimination after it restricted access to PragerU videos, SPLC attacked PragerU and PragerU also found itself cut off from Amazon Smile.
Liberal bias runs the risk of silencing conservatives and Christians if big tech companies follow the SPLC in branding dissent from liberal causes “hateful.” Apple can take a big step to reassure conservatives it will not allow its liberal bias to alienate those who disagree. All the company need do is separate itself from the SPLC.
Follow the author of this article on Twitter at @Tyler2ONeil.
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