8 ms·
Marc Benioff: I no longer believe National Guard is needed for SF
- electric_muse 1y agoThat was fast! I guess that wasn’t the most profitable position to hold. Fail fast!
- nitwit005 1y agoHe seemed to want free security for his event (he talked about all the extra security he was hiring). I suspect he learned he'd get free protests too. The San Francisco reddit discussion of this included such lines as "Welp, picking up my frog costume from Temu asap.", and "San Francisco must out gay them": https://www.reddit.com/r/sanfrancisco/comments/1o7mexv/trump_suggests_san_francisco_could_be_next_for/ https://www.reddit.com/r/sanfrancisco/comments/1o7mexv/trump...
- dzhiurgis 1y ago> free security Why would you need security in any civilised place tho. That’s insane.
- nitwit005 1y agoHost an event in Texas, and you'll find venues requiring you to hire armed security if alcohol is served. Even weddings.
- judahmeek 1y agoKey word in parent post was "civilized". Disclaimer: I live in Texas.
- rsynnott 1y ago> you'll find venues requiring you to hire armed security if alcohol is served. Even weddings. ... Wait, wtf? Is this real? What's the concern? Like, this sounds like a joke about America, rather than a real thing that happens in America.
- bigyabai 1y agoGuns, in one word. If you prefer longer answers, it's because police are not the rent-a-cop for private property. There are definitely social situations where additional security is warranted, that should be clear to most Americans. That security has to come at the expense of those who finance contrived social situations on private property, though.
- bananapub 1y agouh the police literally are the rent-a-cops - this entire thing was about him hiring off-duty cops to stand around, getting paid at cop overtime rates, with their guns, at his conference.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- myvoiceismypass 1y agoWhy would you need security at a place like a marathon (say, in Boston). Its just people running and cheering, right?
- basisword 1y ago>> He seemed to want free security for his event Which is really stupid. If I was going to an event and suddenly heard it was so dangerous there that the national guard had been deployed, I would not go to the event. Who would?
- bpodgursky 1y agoTruly generous of Benioff to nuke downtown SF with Prop C, and then propose sending in the military to fix the problem he created.
- tchalla 1y ago> Prominent startup investor Ron Conway, who backed companies including Google, Airbnb and Stripe, resigned from the board of the Salesforce Foundation on Thursday. According to the New York Times, Conway told Benioff in an email that their "values were no longer aligned." Money talks > Opposition to Benioff’s initial suggestion also came from Garry Tan, CEO of startup incubator Y Combinator. He wrote on X that “We don’t need the National Guard,” but he used his post to go after liberal local officials and judges perceived as too lenient.
- jleyank 1y agoI guess that egg's a bear to scrape off, particularly if it gets into the hairs and bristles. The cocoon of these techbros must be pretty thick, or they pay for their money with sense?
- exasperaited 1y agoSomething, finally, is shifting. It’ll be six months before any of the administration-aligned opportunistic techbro CEOs speak out, but they know where their employees will be tomorrow.
- Yeul 1y agoThe trade war with China could be a turning point. Right now the Chinese are still relying on US tech but what happens if they actually manage to become self sufficient? What if those data centres at the Tibetan Plateau no longer needs Nvidia?
- exasperaited 1y agoIt will be a domestic event that does it. Perhaps the imprisoning on trumped-up charges of a CEO who refuses to hand over 10% of the business to Trump's fascism slush fund. Perhaps ICE disappearing a foreign-born exec. And they will all try to ignore it for as long as possible.
- Gigachad 1y agoIt’s already happening. For most tech products, it’s not that replicating them is impossibly hard, it’s that there is no market to sell them to while everyone can still buy the existing market leader. Cut them off from Google Play or GPUs and suddenly you have a whole population with no choice but to buy and support the development of an alternative.
- 29athrowaway 1y agoAfter reading that for the first time I created a greasemonkey script that replaces "Marc Benioff" with "man responsible for the largest phallic structure in western US" so that I don't have to read his name again.
- nocoiner 1y agoReminds me of the plugin I used to have that replaced every instance of “millennials” with “snake people” and every instance of “Great Recession” with “Time of Shedding and Cold Rocks.”
- myvoiceismypass 1y agoThanks for reminding me I programmatically no longer _have_ to see the same orange face daily when reading news. Totally forgot about greasemonkey!
- AnimalMuppet 1y agoIt was never needed. (The FBI and the US Marshalls, who are actually trained for law enforcement? OK, you could perhaps make a case. The National Guard? After an earthquake, sure, but not before then.)
- Yeul 1y agoIf I was a police detective in the US I would be pretty angry at the notion of a bunch of rural weekend warriors taking over my job. I mean if it was this easy why was the police created at all? We've always had soldiers.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- esseph 1y agoPolice detectives aren't running riot patrols. Military Police especially, but many units get actual training and experience in dealing with scenarios. They train for riot control and facility protection. They do it in combat zones, and have been pretty much in a roll non-stop around the world since 2001. The idea of a National Guard that resembled the one of the 80s didn't exist after especially 2003. I know NG infantry units that went on more deployments over a 9 year span than Active Duty units because of training schedule issues. --- Leaning on an LLM a bit for the next part, but check this out: Horn of Africa: Vermont National Guard deployed a unit to the region in January 2025. In July 2025, an Indiana Guard unit began a rotation with Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa. Kuwait: The Pennsylvania National Guard deployed soldiers to Kuwait in February 2025. The New York Army National Guard also sent soldiers to Kuwait and Africa in September 2025. Kosovo: Idaho Army National Guard soldiers deployed to Kosovo in August 2024. In April 2025, the Louisiana Guard's "Tiger Brigade" held a deployment ceremony for an overseas mission that could include time in Kosovo. Poland: Massachusetts Guard soldiers returned from a NATO support mission in Poland in September 2025. Germany: In April 2025, the Kentucky Guard MEDEVAC unit prepared for a deployment to Europe. Vermont Air National Guard deployed F-35A aircraft and airmen to Kadena Air Base in Japan in January 2025.
- tlogan 1y ago[flagged]
- napierzaza 1y ago[dead]
- igor47 1y agoThe best way to fight the mean bullies is by using the military with like tanks and rifles. That'll keep us safe from blue haired queers with... ummm... Instagram?
- amazingman 1y ago> When I say things people don't like it's free speech. When people express their anger at my free speech it's harassment. Modern American "conservatism", distilled.
- add-sub-mul-div 1y agoThe best I can gather quickly is that this guy was a Democrat donor in the 2010s, then turned into a Trumper more recently, and now he's walking back the Trumping due to backlash? Am I reading it correctly that he's just empty/beliefless and sucks up to whoever has more power at a given time?
- xbar 1y agoDo you remember his Dalai Lama billboard? I'm certain it was sincere reverence.
- _--__--__ 1y agoHe's never been a 'Trumper', at least not publicly. He got into a very public spat with the Harris campaign over failed attempts to set up an interview in his role as the owner of Time magazine, and seems to have soured on the Dem Party establishment since.
- saubeidl 1y agoSo another oligarch who got his ego hurt and lashed out and started associating with the far-right, just like the rest of them.
- schmichael 1y ago> Benioff said he “avidly supported President Trump” http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/124475145.cms http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/124475145.cms
- add-sub-mul-div 1y agoWow I guess David is no longer the worst Benioff, for fucking up Game of Thrones.
- netsharc 1y agoSeems like the lack of values and "flexibility" is what's required to be a billionaire. Remember who was at the front row of Trump's Inauguration II? Musk, Bezos, Zuck...
- JCM9 1y agoI care less about how they fix the problem and more about that the problem is fixed. SF has gone dramatically downhill. I remember what it used to be like, a lovely city. Walking around SF now is depressing.
- saubeidl 1y agoThe problem is massive inequality putting people on the streets, driven by people like Mr. Benioff.
- ajross 1y ago> I care less about how they fix the problem That's the logic that got Benioff in trouble. FWIW: people like you have to realize that the Guard is not and has never been a law enforcement apparatus. The policy goal of "sending in the troops" to US cities is not and has never been crime (the metrics for which are getting better and not worse, yes even in SF). The goal of putting military force in charge of directing civilians on city streets is and has always been giving the President, who commands that military, direct control over city streets. Right now if the white house doesn't like a protest or doesn't want it to happen, there's nothing they can do bureaucratically using their executive power to prevent it. It's a local thing. If the guard is already there waiting for orders, they can. It sounds like hyperbole, but it's really not: the transparent purpose to this big National Guard kerfuffle is the military suppression of dissent at the direction of the President.
- g-b-r 1y agoI think it's for many more things than suppression of protests
- RickJWagner 1y agoPlease provide a source that suggests Trump has suppressed a protest or something similar.
- ajross 1y agoSeriously? It was widely reported that he attempted exactly that during the Floyd protests in 2020 (first link I got, but Esper's testimony was reported everywhere, pick your preferred media, or just find and watch the committee hearing): https://www.npr.org/2022/05/09/1097517470/trump-esper-book-defense-secretary https://www.npr.org/2022/05/09/1097517470/trump-esper-book-d... That time it failed because the pentagon leadership and generals stood in unison against it and he backed down. The guardrails have been rejiggered this time and it's only the courts that protect us now.
- tlogan 1y agoOf course. For anyone who thinks this is just “money talk,” try wearing a “Make America Great” hat in San Francisco. That’s all I need to say about the sad state of politics here.
- amazingman 1y agoWearing a MAGA hat in this specific political moment is a statement of callousness and overt approval of military and masked goons in our streets.
- rufus_foreman 1y ago>> Wearing a MAGA hat in this specific political moment is a a statement of callousness and overt approval of military and masked goons in our streets In other words, it is free speech. Should free speech be met with violence?
- tlogan 1y ago> Should free speech be met with violence? Free speech is overrated. We, the intellectuals, must make sure everyone is properly educated and understands that their thinking is dangerous to progress and humanity. /s
- amazingman 1y agoThat's a shiny echo chamber you have going there.
- amazingman 1y agoI've seen people wearing MAGA hats in SF, and they're never assaulted. Their speech is not infringed or suppressed. At "worst" they are sometimes met with more free speech coming in the form of opinions about their choices. Is this what you're complaining about?
- tlogan 1y ago
- Simulacra 1y agoThis is why it's so hard to speak your mind in Silicon Valley, if you say anything out of the norm, they will come after you. I think he really does believe the National Guard is needed in San Francisco, but that's not the regional sentiment, and it's only inciting violence against you when you come out with comments like that.
- John23832 1y agoNobody came after him. He spoke his mind and then others spoke their mind. That is what everyone is allowed.
- UncleMeat 1y agoNo don't you understand? Free speech is when conservatives speak their minds to advocate for the state deploying a force of violence against its own citizens and democrats shut up. /s
- rsynnott 1y ago... One very odd conception of freedom of speech that some people have is that _they_ should be free to say whatever they want, but that _other people_ must then take their nonsense seriously and may not criticise it. The story here is fairly simple; stupid guy says something stupid, is humiliated by the people pointing and laughing at the stupid thing he said, backs off.
- ZeroGravitas 1y agoIn this case the guy literally calling for armed soldiers to be positioned on US streets is being defended by an HN commenter who thinks disagreeing with that opinion is violence.
- pityJuke 1y agoIn 2025, with a Trump presidency, and the majority of mainstream tech at least acquiescing to him, he would have faced massive difficulties expressing this point? In all honesty, if he hadn’t backed down he would have faced zero important repercussions.