Karl Auerbach on Nostr: Both Google and Microsoft are publicly held. I can see these gifts of shareholder ...

Both Google and Microsoft are publicly held. I can see these gifts of shareholder property as being viewed as bribes by corporate management for non-business purposes.

(This is the evil that Citizens United created - corporate management using shareholder assets [the corporate treasury] to fund contributions that are not approved by those shareholders - it is a massive form of leverage using the property of others.)

I would not be surprised to see this turn into derivative lawsuits by shareholders against the corporate directors and officers.

(What is "fun" about derivative actions is that they are technically a lawsuit brought by the corporation against its management - and thus it can end up that the corporate treasury pays the legal bills on both sides.)

It would not also surprise me to see a brave state attorney general raise the possibility of criminal charges based on notions of corruption (particularly if payments are made to an offshore account.)

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/jan/09/google-microsoft-donate-trump-inaugural-fund