In this episode, we break down the revelations around David Sacks, the venture capitalist now serving as the Trump administration’s de-facto AI czar, while simultaneously holding deep financial ties across the AI industry he’s helping shape.Following the New York Times’ recent reporting, we examine how Sacks positioned himself at the center of both AI policy and AI investing, and what happens when the person influencing federal AI strategy is also betting on the companies affected by those decisions.Is this a historic conflict of interest? A new model of tech-government entanglement? Or simply the inevitable outcome of Silicon Valley’s growing political power?We dig into:
- How Sacks became the administration’s key voice on AI
- The scale of his investments in AI companies
- What “no conflict, no interest” looks like in practice
- Why industry insiders are divided on whether this is savvy or dangerous
- What this means for AI regulation, startups, and U.S. competitiveness
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We're so numb at this point to just the level of self dealing
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in this administration that, you know, just not fully divesting
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from your BC fund, you know, when you go into a special
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Welcome back to the Newcomer podcast, Tom Doton.
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Here I'm joined by Eric newcomer Madeline Renbarger.
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We're talking now about David Sachs, a man of many opinions,
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both his own and the way people feel about him.
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I'm excited to get into this one because we've got thoughts.
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And the reason David is in the news is the New York Times on
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Sunday of this week, I think it was Sunday, put out a big piece,
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big expose, Man, I sound like Tucker Carlson when I said that
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I don't want to load. I don't want to load it too much
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right now. They had an expose.
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It was apparently many months in the making where they were
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trying to fairly deliberately show the conflicts of interest
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that David Sachs has as the AI and crypto czar to the Trump
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administration with his ongoing role as a venture capitalist.
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He is the thing managing partner at Craft Ventures.
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And basically the story lays out that while in this role, he has
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been advocating for kind of maximalist AI policies that, you
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know, do not burden AI with a lot of regulation.
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And then same with crypto, probably even more so with
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crypto. And he's also, you know, got
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these ongoing investments that are theoretically benefited by
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all of these policies. And just as like the last part
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of this recap, it was, you know, when the article came out,
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became a whole thing on on Twitter, David Sachs called it,
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you know, a hit job and a hoax and said the New York Times was
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later spiraling. And, and you had all these VCs
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and founders rushing to defend David Sachs, saying how
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important he was to them and to their families and their
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children and really one, one of the great men of all time, David
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Sachs. And then, you know, the
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reporters in the story, including Ryan Mack, who is
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known for getting into fights on Twitter, very vocally defending
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the story. And it was all kind of a mess.
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So that was my rundown of everything that happened over
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the last couple of days. But let's just start off with
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David Sachs, the guy, because he's been this figure for a long
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time. I mean, Eric, you were writing a
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lot about Zenefits back in the day, which was the first time
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David Sachs seriously crossed my radar.
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So I imagine you've been following the opinions about him
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for a while. I mean what all?
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Right. So, so you know, David Sachs,
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member of the PayPal Mafia, confidant of Peter Thiel in some
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ways the guy in the PayPal Mafia who really did the work.
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I mean, I think he was the chief operating officer.
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And so he was often the one like really, really grinding.
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So he he built this great network that includes some of
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the people circling the wagons for him.
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After this New York Times story, he found a sort of early version
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of Slack called Yammer that sells for a good bit of money,
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establishes him as a successful entrepreneur.
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Though Yammer, which I, I believe what purchased
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Microsoft. Yeah, it doesn't last as like a
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product. I, I, I think feels like sort of
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a hollow exit. You know, one of these sort of
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people make money and then acquisition goes nowhere sort of
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deals. Yeah.
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I got introduced to him in this fight over Zenefits, you know,
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Parker Conrad, now the CEO of Ripling gets forced out.
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David Sachs, Andreessen Horowitz go to war with this founder
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pinning all the blame on Parker Conrad.
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And yeah, I'd say that was a moment where I was deeply
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skeptical of Sax. You know, he's sort of ruthless
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in prosecuting the case against Parker.
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He brings in this guy, Lanny Davis, who's like real sort of,
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you know, DC fixer type, you know, lawyer PR guy just to go
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to war against Parker who's not not really equipped for to have,
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you know, all the powers that be marshaled against him.
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And Sax is just very, very, you know, lawyerly himself, couple
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other, you know, key facts. I mean David Sacks, literally.
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Zenefits also crumbles under. Yeah, Zenfits.
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Crumbles yeah. Sacks takes over.
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He doesn't save the company. You know, it, it's it's
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terrible. He like passes it off to
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somebody else and the whole thing is, is a disaster.
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So they certainly don't save the company.
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By Alsine Parker to, you know, a couple other quick points on
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Sacks. He he writes a book with Peter
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Thiel that says, you know, date rape isn't rape.
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So he he's somebody who's, you know, sort of conservative
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through and through. He's one of the four besties on
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the All In podcasts, along with Chamoth, Polly, Hopatia and
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Jason Calcanis and David Friedberg.
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And he's a smug guy who thinks he's super smart.
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I think in reality, he's made a bunch of money on Solana.
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He he's, you know, an investor. He started this firm, Craft
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Ventures that goes big on the cryptocurrency Solana, which
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obviously is known in the crypto world as sort of being an
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insider's insider sort of token. And then when Trump gets
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elected, you know, he's supportive of the Republicans
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and Trump. When Trump gets elected, he
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becomes Trump's AI and Cryptozar while keeping a foot still still
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doing the podcast frequently, still tied to his investment for
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right. He's still at craft.
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Yeah. He hasn't divested from.
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I mean, he's, he's, you know. He doesn't divest.
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He has he's he's claimed to have removed himself from some
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interests, but he has not left craft.
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He's a sort of free market capitalist type type guy.
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And so he, you know, he's basically the industry guy that
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Trump brings in to boost AI and crypto.
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And then the New York Times set off investigating him.
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Yeah, and I mean you, this was a very objective, dispassionate
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for you at least reading of David Sacks.
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I mean, he has developed this this persona.
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And maybe it's just who he is. I've not, I've never met the
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guy. But extremely unpleasant.
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He likes to get in fights with people.
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He's he's extremely condescending, you know, very
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triumphalist in, you know, the way that they kind of very late,
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relatively laid back Trump. And you know, he like the joke I
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would make is that he basically podcasted himself into an
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administration appointment, right?
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Well, I think they tried they they would have preferred
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DeSantis, but then once they realized this Trump thing was
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going to happen again, right, They got.
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Host a fundraiser for him, gets him as a guest on the All In
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podcast. And then as the article points
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out, like, you know, they're able to use the podcast as a
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business to kind of promote itself with the Trump
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administration. I mean, Madeline, you were at
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the Hill and Valley Conference, which gets mentioned in the New
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York Times article. I mean, that's an that's an all
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in branded event, more or less. And Trump is like, you know,
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the, the, the guest of honor, right?
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Yeah, so I attended their, you know, AI summit that they hosted
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Co host with Hill and Valley. And an interesting anecdote in
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the New York Times piece was, which I didn't realize at the
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time was that the summit was actually just going to be hosted
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by all in. And Susie Wiles thought that
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that was too deep of a like a conflict of interest and didn't
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look great. And so they had to scramble to
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find a more DC focused Co host for this event.
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So it wasn't just a 2 hour live podcast, which is what it was,
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or an all day podcast. So they brought in the Hill and
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Valley guys that were known kind of tech government fixtures, but
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more government leaning rather than tech leaning to make it
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seem legitimate, which is quite funny.
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But it was it was a, you know, mingling of powerful people in
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government and different secretaries like secretary of
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energy spoke and they would just sit on the couch with the
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besties. And it was basically a live
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podcast. That is what it was.
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The the thing about Saks that always bothered me before we
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even get into the article, beyond just his politics, which
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I think are reprehensible, is that there there's so much
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phoniness in presentation with his whole persona.
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I mean, this idea that he's just out there.
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Like the poor man's Tucker Carl. Yeah, it's.
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Like sort of disingenuous. He comes in with his like
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talking points on the podcast. He eats up airtime like nobody.
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He tries to find foils that don't really seem prepared to go
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toe to toe with him. Like and you know, he also the
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all in dynamic is you got David who's like part listen,
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Republican talking the talking points.
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You've got David Friedberg who wants to talk science and stay
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out of it. You have Chamath Paul Yabatia,
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who is, you know, total was a Democrat, but clearly it was
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totally opportunistic and it's just trying to sort of grift
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every which way. I've called him the scam in the
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arena. And then you have Jason
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Calcanis, who I think at one point it was sincerely a
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Democrat, but like no Democrat would hold him up as like,
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that's the guy we want to really go toe to toe with David Sacks.
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So David Sacks, just, you know, it's.
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A Hannity that he. Has this forum exactly Jason is
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Colmes where it's like he's sort of the, you know, the guy.
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Trolled opposition. To be?
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Yes, exactly. Yeah, he represents the other
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side, but he's so hapless that you're just like, well, they
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must be wrong then, right? If that's if, David.
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Sacks is like a constant foil, you know, in the newsletter.
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Like, I mean, one of my more viral tweets was I said, like, I
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think honestly, Tom, you ghost wrote it for me, but before you
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worked for us. But you know, no libertarians in
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a bankrupt, no atheist in a foxhole, no libertarians in a
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bank run. Like, you know, he's this
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ultimate libertarian and then the silk Silicon Valley Bank is
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at risk of going under and sort of screwing over Silicon Valley.
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And all of a sudden all in and David Sachs are like hysterical
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trying to get the government to step in.
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And so it's like total self interested.
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And you know, I just read every one minor thing that Sachs has
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been doing recently is he's been calling out the anthropic guys.
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I think this came up in our Reid Hoffman episode that we just
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published. He, you know, Sachs, it says
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basically all the anthropic stuff is insincere and that
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they're just trying to get government capture.
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And I think Reid's point of view of my point of view was just
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that Sachs is so insincere in every point of view that he
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holds that he can't see somebody else offer a point of view and
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say, oh, that's their actual perspective, that they're, they
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think there might need to be a little regulation.
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And and so he just sees everything as some like, you
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know, cynical strategy. Yeah.
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Even further than that, he is not divested from his firm and
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in the government administration and is complaining about
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Anthropic saying, hey, maybe we should have some regulation
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about this. Like you're you, you want it for
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your guys, You know, you're in there.
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You just don't want it to be unfettered.
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I don't know. It just felt kind of
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hypocritical. Yeah.
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And as a last bit of like insider, you know, insight into
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all of this, you know, when when Marc Benioff was getting in the
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news for asking for San Francisco to be ruled by martial
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law and, you know, there was a big media cycle around that.
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It was around the same time as as Dreamforce was going on.
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And Benioff has this big dinner at at Dreamforce at the top of
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Salesforce. Sorry.
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Yeah, at the top of Salesforce Tower.
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David Sachs was there. Dario from Anthropic was also
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there. That got a little awkward.
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Dario left before the dinner portion of the night.
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So make of that, which you will, but David Sachs was seated at
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the same table as Marc Benioff. And then the next day, David
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Sachs tweets out in defense of Benioff.
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Hey, do you thinking about maybe joining the Republican Party?
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We'd love to have you. As if there's some sort of
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authentic interaction where he's inviting him in.
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Things are always less organic on Twitter than they seem.
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Yeah, always less organic. Yeah, but he knew it would be
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provocative and stuff like that Anyway, so that's David Sachs.
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I think we're all in agreement. He's obnoxious.
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We don't agree with his politics.
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We have no desire to really defend him in any circumstance
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except, unfortunately, the New York Times article.
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Which here we go. Yeah, I mean, I don't know even
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where to start with this thing. The the the the attempt of the
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peace was to draw a connection between all of his holdings with
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the policies that he's advocating for and saying this
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guy is like conflicted out the ass.
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And you know, I, I don't know, it's, it's just another sign of
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corruption in the Trump administration.
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And I guess what I was really disappointed by, because I would
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have loved to see someone take a huge crack at David Sacks
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because I find him so obnoxious. Is that like there was nothing
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that they had in there That really was surprising to me.
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We knew going into his appointment that this was a
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representative of Silicon Valley, that the Trump
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administration was going to be a pro crypto administration.
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That was very clear from from his from, from Donald, from
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junior, you know, there was a lot of complaints around the
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Biden administration and kind of onerous regulation around AI
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and, and that wasn't going to be the case here.
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And basically what the article is saying is like, well, because
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David Sachs holds stakes in AI companies and AI startups,
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therefore he's conflicted and that's like informing his like
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self enriching decisions and. I mean, people went ballistic
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over the headline. Silicon Valley's man in the
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White House is benefiting himself and his friends.
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David Stacks, the Trump administration's AI and
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Cryptozar, has helped formulate policies that aid his Silicon
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Valley friends and many of his own tech investments.
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But it feels like the reality here is just like literally
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everything in tech is AI these days.
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He's a tech investor. He's bullish on AI.
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Therefore, it helps him. I mean, it's almost as if he's,
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it's like the guy's pro, you know, AI and NVIDIA is holding
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up the entire economy. Therefore, you know, he's like
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helping himself. It's like it's it's self dealing
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only to the extent The New York Times has proven it just sort of
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like, yeah, he's generally pro the big thing in tech and he's
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like aligned with that. But he it doesn't have this sort
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of straight line corruption. You know, the Trump
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administration says such a high bar for terrible self dealing
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that this one seems not not as exciting as just a Trump coin,
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you know? Right.
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We're so numb at this point to just the level of self dealing
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in this administration that, you know, just not fully investing
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from your VC fund, you know, when you go into a special
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appointed position is like that's small potatoes.
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But I will say one point in the story that I think we all, you
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know, covering this space could pick apart a little bit was that
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their evidence of the self dealing in part was an analysis
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of all of the companies in Kraft's portfolio and how many
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of them were labeled as AI companies.
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And there were, you know, hundreds that were labeled as AI
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companies. Every startup right now is an AI
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company. Every single one in their
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marketing materials is including AI, even if as we no, they're
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not really doing it. So just noting that their
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portfolio has a lot of mentions of AI to me didn't feel like the
00:14:50
smoking gun that maybe those of us who are already not really
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primed to be on Team David Sachs would be looking for.
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Anybody who follows like my media criticism will know, you
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know, I just don't think this kind of story makes sense
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anymore. Like I'd rather it as a screed
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against David Sachs from the man has no ethics stands for
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everything bad in the world, sort of what we're giving here,
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which is like our perspective. But I think putting that
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perspective through the lens of like, you know, a view from
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nowhere neutral news story when? Or he didn't play revelation in
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a blind trust, right? I mean, that would be the the
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way to kind of and, and previous presidents and administrations
00:15:29
have done that. But like, we're just so far
00:15:31
beyond that, like we're dealing with the administration where
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Cash Patel is using the FBI plane to travel to see his
00:15:37
girlfriend sing the national anthem at WWE events and going
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to like a literal boondoggle ranch.
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I mean, and those stories, by the way, do have impact, you
00:15:46
know, like I there is discussion now about Cash Patel maybe being
00:15:50
on the outs with Trump. And I'm sure shit like this
00:15:53
happened. So it I don't even want to say
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like, oh, nothing will be, you know, journalists right anymore
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have any effect. I mean, it's certainly it's
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harder, you know, but there are stories that do kind of affect
00:16:04
these things and, and you're, yeah, I agree, Eric, like the
00:16:07
sort of like we laid out all the basically publicly available
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information in one narrative and we want you to be shocked and
00:16:13
appalled by it. It just sort of doesn't register
00:16:17
anymore. And and then I really wish that
00:16:20
they could have pointed to specific policies that were like
00:16:24
upsetting or controversial that only came into existence because
00:16:28
of his ties to, you know, the industry and his holdings in.
00:16:31
AI feels like just generic deregulation stuff.
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I mean the most interesting thing is like the interplay on
00:16:39
China, but it doesn't go super deep.
00:16:42
On Yeah, I wanted more about that because I feel like, you
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know, Jensen has been cozying up so much to the Trump
00:16:47
administration around these chip deals to be allowed to still
00:16:50
sell chips to China. That was a huge piece of the
00:16:53
hill and valley and all in event I went to was discussing this
00:16:57
kind of policy. It seems like that is an area
00:17:01
that could have been really fruitful and there could have
00:17:03
been more scoops or, you know, deeper insights into what is
00:17:07
driving the chip China policy and if it's being entirely
00:17:11
steered by, you know, people who want to do business in China
00:17:14
even though it's unpopular with the rest of the party.
00:17:17
But that wasn't really there. Yeah.
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The last thing on this too is is, you know, the one or one
00:17:25
policy or stance of the administration has taken that I
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think is a little more controversial with AI.
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Is this belief that AI training should be allowed to train on,
00:17:35
on any material that it wants to.
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That you don't really need to worry about compensation of, of,
00:17:40
of the original creators of this material.
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Because basically robots have the right to read or AI has the
00:17:45
right to read which. Which, which pits 1 industry
00:17:48
against another, right? It was like Hollywood publishing
00:17:51
caring about copyright, Disney, you know, versus tech, which
00:17:54
doesn't. So in a, in a, in a
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administration ruled by big business, it still could go
00:18:00
either way. And obviously Sax is on the side
00:18:02
of tech here, right? And, and, you know, the courts
00:18:05
are kind of mixed on on which side they're going to fall on.
00:18:08
And, you know, I at some point this probably will get to the
00:18:10
Supreme Court. The New York Times did not lean
00:18:13
into that at all. And I don't know if this is
00:18:15
true, but it is a little bit concerning that New York Times
00:18:18
also has a pending an, sorry, an ongoing lawsuit against open AI
00:18:23
over this exact fact over over whether or not, you know, it
00:18:27
illegally trained on their articles.
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And, you know, I don't know if the reason it wasn't included is
00:18:32
because of that. They often disclose that in
00:18:34
articles about open AI. You know, New York Times is sued
00:18:36
in open, you know, yeah, anyway. But it just shows that, like,
00:18:40
conflicts are sort of widely dispersed these days.
00:18:43
And it, you know, I guess the next part that we should get to
00:18:47
is like the response, which, you know, we talked about David
00:18:50
Sachs, who called it a hoax and bullshit.
00:18:51
They're spiraling. And that's not even surprising,
00:18:54
but you saw basically every major member of the tech
00:18:57
community tweeting out in support of David Sachs and how
00:19:01
important he is. And I saw Greg Brockman, I saw
00:19:04
Sam Altman, I saw, I don't know there any people that stuck out
00:19:07
to you? Sam stuck out to me in
00:19:08
particular given, you know, the back and forth there.
00:19:11
But yeah, it was kind of it seemed like they're the heavy
00:19:14
hitters. It was everyone.
00:19:15
It was every VC that you know, has like a big picture presence.
00:19:18
I thought the circling the wagons was more troubling than
00:19:22
the New York Times story. You know, it, it, it feels very
00:19:25
much about how all these tech people are treating Trump, where
00:19:28
it's like you go to the dinners, you say only positive things
00:19:31
about him. Like the you know, when JD
00:19:34
Vance, when they were running for office, basically said he
00:19:37
didn't see any separation between big business and
00:19:41
government. And like, I I feel like that
00:19:45
this circling the wagons, like, oh, we all need to pay homage to
00:19:48
David Sacks. That's honestly part of what's
00:19:50
really worrying with what this administration is doing.
00:19:54
And so the sense that, yeah, everybody needed to come and
00:19:57
like, but, you know, but a kiss up to David Sachs over like a
00:20:02
silly New York Times story. I mean, it speaks.
00:20:04
I mean, Tom, I think you were saying this earlier, but it
00:20:06
speaks to the power of the New York Times, that they're all
00:20:09
like, obsessed about it. But yeah, I hated the circling
00:20:12
the wagons. I do have Sam's tweet if it's
00:20:14
interesting to read. David Sachs really understands
00:20:17
AI and cares about the US leading an innovation.
00:20:20
I am grateful we have him so just very.
00:20:24
I'm grateful we have. Him.
00:20:25
We're so grateful. We're so grateful.
00:20:27
It's just very Tim Cook bringing, you know, gold to the
00:20:30
White House. I don't know.
00:20:31
Yeah, yeah. But the one who continually, you
00:20:34
know, disappoints me in all of this is, is is Marc Benioff, who
00:20:39
basically tweeted the same shit. His was a bit more specific to
00:20:42
the New York Times, saying it was.
00:20:43
I'm reading his tweet now. It was a distortion of his
00:20:45
leadership. And he said it isn't journalism,
00:20:48
it's almost strategic sabotage. Dude, you are the owner of Time
00:20:52
magazine. You're and something that you
00:20:54
take very seriously. If you think that you want to,
00:20:58
you know, be a steward of journalism, you're going to have
00:21:00
to deal with articles you don't disagree that you don't agree
00:21:02
with. But to call it a sabotage and
00:21:05
not journalism just shows to me that you're not a serious owner
00:21:08
of a media company. You are.
00:21:10
Most stories are way weaker. We're not.
00:21:12
I mean, this is just like it's a reasonable effort.
00:21:14
You know, I, I didn't think the headline was that misleading.
00:21:17
I mean, it is helping him. Not in maybe the conspiratorial
00:21:21
way you want, but yeah, it's a perfectly fine story.
00:21:24
Yeah, it, it didn't, you know, hit the mark for me.
00:21:27
And like, it's easily defeated and deconstructed in, in, in
00:21:32
retrospect, but to say it's not journalism and then a strategic
00:21:35
sabotage is so antithetical to what an actual media owner who
00:21:39
cares about journalism should be caring about that it completely
00:21:42
undermines your credibility as that person.
00:21:45
And like, I think the and, and the last part of this, for me at
00:21:48
least, is like, you see, you're still seeing texts circling the
00:21:51
wagons around David Sachs, of course, but also Trump in
00:21:53
general. And this is happening at a time
00:21:54
that Trump's disapproval ratings are record highs.
00:21:58
It's not looking good for Trump right now.
00:21:59
It's looking real lame duck right now.
00:22:01
Real lame duck. Yeah, yeah, Gallup, I think is
00:22:04
like the worst it's ever been for him and for almost any
00:22:06
president during their second term.
00:22:08
There's a history of these things.
00:22:09
They tend to get wiped out in the midterms and they're
00:22:11
basically, like you said, Madeline, like a lame duck for
00:22:13
the rest of their administration.
00:22:14
So everything that you were banking on, this whole tech
00:22:17
Trump MAGA tech thing that has existed for the whole thing
00:22:20
could fly off the rails in, in the next year.
00:22:22
And everything that you have staked your reputation on could
00:22:25
be gone. And so really at this moment
00:22:27
where you, if you were smart, might be thinking like, we
00:22:30
should back away because clearly these people don't have actual
00:22:32
morals and, and, and, and closely held beliefs.
00:22:35
So why don't you just lean into that and say, oh, looks like
00:22:38
Trump isn't going too well right now.
00:22:39
Maybe we should back off and see how we can work with the, you
00:22:42
know, potential Democratic House and maybe even Democratic
00:22:45
Senate. Instead, you're circling the
00:22:46
wagon around David Sachs, who is obnoxious.
00:22:48
So you don't even really like all that much and are now going
00:22:51
to like be stuck with, you know, potentially 11 more months of
00:22:54
effectiveness from from the Trump administration and then
00:22:57
uselessness. But it just shows that these
00:22:59
guys have no not even like closely held beliefs and morals,
00:23:02
but political instincts. Like, the least you could do is
00:23:04
recognize the state of the. Fair.
00:23:06
They're still in charge for like, what, three more years?
00:23:09
A lot, You know, maybe they're never gonna leave office.
00:23:12
You know, you. I don't know, Maybe they know
00:23:14
something we don't. But.
00:23:16
Yeah, I wish that were the bet. I think they're just like we're
00:23:18
still betting on like a, you know, Democratic.
00:23:21
Yeah, fascism, authoritarian, dictatorship, autocracy.
00:23:26
Great. Just just be open about that.
00:23:29
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