Contributed by Manuela Battaglini Manrique de Lara

A group of Silicon Valley billionaires aims to end democracy, not only American democracy, but democracy across the entire world. That is, their plan is to establish a technocratic dictatorship, and its foremost representative is JD Vance, that is, the vice president of the U.S. This contribution we are presenting is extremely critical of the big technology companies. That is to be expected, because as they consolidate, and given the light the second Trump Administration has shone on them, and as organized groups and protests begin to appear on social media – they do not yet dominate us completely – the Laboratorio's need to examine trends and facts leads us to dig deeper into this and also to make known possible “unknowns,” who are low-profile people but of great power in these fields, as is the case of Peter Thiel, who has been called “Trump's left hand” on these matters and who keeps a far lower profile than Elon Musk, but whose influence is no less powerful than his in the American Administration.

Let's start piece by piece: who are these billionaires? Most of them come from a Silicon Valley group called the PayPal Mafia (see an expanded section on this at the end of the note). Among PayPal's cofounders is Elon Musk, and we already know the mess he is making, and Peter Thiel, who is also a cofounder of Palantir (see the clarification about Palantir at the end of this note), the largest surveillance company in the world (see a much more extensive explanation of what Palantir is at the end of this note).

The connection to apartheid South Africa

South Africa has a lot to do with this. To put it in context:

Elon Musk lived in apartheid South Africa until he was 17.

David Sacks, a businessman, author, politician and investor who has been chair of the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology since 2025, and who became a fundraiser for Donald Trump, left at the age of five and grew up in a South African diaspora family in Tennessee.

Peter Thiel spent years of his childhood in South Africa and Namibia, where his father was involved in uranium mining as part of the apartheid regime's clandestine campaign to acquire nuclear weapons.

And Paul Furber, an obscure South African software developer and tech journalist who lives near Johannesburg, has been identified by two teams of forensic linguists as the creator of the QAnon conspiracy, which helped shape Trump's MAGA movement.

In short, four of the most influential voices in MAGA are white men in their fifties with formative experiences in apartheid South Africa.

What do they have in common?

One thing many white South Africans who lived through the end of apartheid have in common with today's American right: a contempt for government. The apartheid regime and then the African National Congress left millions of South Africans without electricity, dignity, safety or a decent education. That experience can encourage anti-government libertarianism.

The plan: private cities and control of governments

Let's go back to this Silicon Valley group. What their plan consists of:

To begin with, creating California Forever, a city this group of billionaires wants to build about 80 kilometers from San Francisco.

They despise democracy. These Trump-loving tech multimillionaires believe democracy is bad. They want to create their own corporate dictatorships called Network States. They are actively trying to build these small, strange dictatorial cities around the world, including California.

In addition, they want to control existing governments. In San Francisco, a group of these tech multimillionaires is trying to gain control of City Hall. Peter Thiel is one of the ideologues of this plan and has J.D. Vance, vice president of the United States, as his partner in crime.

Let's stay in San Francisco to talk about another character in this group: Garry Tan.

Garry Tan is the CEO of Y Combinator, a famous San Francisco venture capital firm that is currently leading a tech-funded campaign to take over San Francisco's city government.

His attacks on Twitter against San Francisco's Democratic politicians are recurrent, and he even donated $100,000 to the recall campaign against District Attorney Chesa Boudin, who was recalled in 2022, and that is how Garry Tan came to be named CEO of Y Combinator. Sam Altman, CEO of Open AI, praised Garry Tan for his political activism.

Garry Tan got carried away and in a YouTube video promised to “eliminate” all the supervisors who opposed robo-taxis in San Francisco, listing them one by one.

Garry Tan is one of the Silicon Valley billionaires who want to build privately governed cities as part of the “network state” movement. In San Francisco, he is working on an adjacent strategy. But Garry Tan's plans are to capture the San Francisco government in the November elections and hold it hostage to his demands.

Third, they want to punish Democrats in strange ways. One of their main influencers, Balaji Srinivasan, has suggested that tech colleagues should form a “gray tribe,” purge San Francisco Democrats and build statues to remind people how bad Democrats are.

Balaji Srinivasan and the Network States

Balaji Srinivasan is another member of this group. A serial entrepreneur and former chief technology officer of Coinbase, he published his influential book titled “The Network State: How to Start a New Country,” which presents a revolutionary idea in the field of governance, defining the network state as “a highly aligned online community with a capacity for collective action that crowdfunds territory around the world and eventually attains diplomatic recognition from pre-existing states.”

These initiatives are not limited to theorizing; they are actively working to make these digital-first sovereign communities a reality. Some of the main network state initiatives are:

  • Praxis: “a global community developing a shared culture, institutions and infrastructure. Praxis is a home for the brave, who strive for virtue and wisdom. Our purpose is to restore Western civilization and pursue our ultimate destiny of life among the stars.”

Praxis seeks to build a new city on the Mediterranean coast, governed and built by the community. The team has already gained significant traction, with more than 80,000 community members, significant funding from entities such as Winklevoss Capital, Benchmark Ventures, Paradigm and others, and has hired a leading team that includes a former G7 prime minister to support negotiations and city planning.

The goal is for the first citizens to move to the new city of Praxis within this decade.

From blockchain-based governance platforms to special economic zones, each project contributes to the evolution of the narrative of decentralized, digital communities with a physical nexus.

Will they succeed? They are at different stages of development and still face unique challenges, but there is growing interest in redefining governance in the digital age.

  • J.D Vance is one of them. He was literally put on Trump's list of candidates by the same group of people –Peter Thiel, David Sacks, Elon Musk, Marc Andreessen– who are behind all the weirdness that journalist Gil Durán has been writing about in The New Republic.

Curtis Yarvin and his influence on Vance

Peter Thiel was JD Vance's benefactor, but both are inspired by an obscure software developer who has some truly terrifying ideas about reorganizing society.

That person is Curtis Yarvin, a San Francisco software developer. He wrote under a pseudonym, proposing a horrible solution for the people he considered “unproductive”: “turn them into biodiesel, which can help fuel Muni buses.”

And he added: “The problem with the biodiesel solution is that nobody would want to live in a city whose public transportation was fueled, even in part, by the distilled remains of its late underclass. Still, it helps our goal, which is a humane alternative to genocide.”

He later said that the best humane alternative to genocide is to lock them up in “permanent solitary confinement” where, to keep them from going insane, they would be plugged into an “immersive virtual reality interface” so they could “experience a rich and fulfilling life in a completely imaginary world.”

Yarvin's manifestos have won influential followers such as Peter Thiel and his Silicon Valley protégé, Vice President J.D. Vance.

What is these people's plan? To implement techno-authoritarianism through Vance in the White House, and then in Europe. And that is exactly what is happening.

The tech multimillionaires behind Trump already have money. Now they want power: to create their own countries, to change what it means to be human, to control the fate of the world. Their interest is mainly ideological, not economic.

Cryptocurrencies also play a HUGE role in this weirdness. Just as they created new currencies to challenge existing currencies, they want to create new countries to challenge existing countries. It is all a matter of power and control.

This shows that we do not have a technology problem; we have a problem of narratives, or of social technology. The old order is dead, people are very angry with the political parties that belong to the old order, and the new ones have not managed to realize what is happening in the dark depths.

Are you really telling me that while this is happening, in Europe we are stuck on whether Apple, when it sends a message to an Android, creates a lack of privacy? Why does Europe smell of mothballs and want to keep smelling of mothballs?

Trump has sold his soul to the devil. He has sold his soul to these sociopathic and psychopathic billionaires, and their plan may work out for them because of the exhaustion people feel toward the status quo. Racist and anti-immigration parties will keep gaining ground. They expel immigrants in front of the cameras, and at the same time let immigrants in so that no one realizes that they are not really the problem. And so, with the other hand, they do and undo these crazy things.

How long did we spend warning that the tech monopolies had to be stopped? How long? YEARS. But the people who make good predictions are expelled from the political conversation. Famous, prestigious economists are paid not to talk about economic inequality, at the university there is no talk of economic inequality, on TV there is no talk of economic inequality which, together with the concentration of power in the hands of a handful of tech billionaires with fascist and exterminationist ideas, are the problem.

I repeat: economic inequality and concentration of power.

Conclusion: we do not have a problem of physical technologies; we have a problem of social technologies, of narrative. There are no positive leaders, only mediocre ones.

We need leaders who design narratives that unite countries, like when J.F. Kennedy spoke those words that still stir us:

“I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth. In a very real sense, it will not be one man going to the Moon—if we make this judgment affirmatively, it will be an entire nation. For all of us must work to put him there.”

It is one of the strongest feelings a human being can feel. I belong to this country, it gives me identity, I feel proud, and it sets me apart from others. Pure social technology.

Supplement: the PayPal Mafia

Supplement I – The PayPal Mafia:

The “PayPal Mafia”: Silicon Valley's Silent Revolutionaries:

At the dawn of the 21st century, as the world teetered between the dot-com collapse and the rise of a new digital era, a group of nonconformists was secretly writing the script of the future. The so-called “PayPal Mafia” – which is not a criminal organization, but a network of former PayPal collaborators —the company that revolutionized online payments— whose ambitions and talents redefined entire industries, from space travel to social media. Their legacy is not just billion-dollar companies, but a model of how audacity, loyalty and a shared vision can alter the course of technology.

The Origins: A Crucible of Heretics:

It all began in 1998, when Peter Thiel and Max Levchin founded Confinity, a startup focused on secure payments for Palm Pilot devices. At the same time, Elon Musk was launching X.com, an online bank. After fierce competition, the two companies merged in 2000 under the name PayPal, creating a system that allowed money to be transferred with an email. In that cauldron of ideas, brilliant and contradictory personalities clashed: Reid Hoffman (future founder of LinkedIn), David Sacks (creator of Yammer), Chad Hurley and Steve Chen (cofounders of YouTube), and Keith Rabois (leader at Square and Opendoor).

PayPal not only survived the bursting of the dot-com bubble, but was acquired by eBay in 2002 for USD 1.5 billion. However, its true impact was revealed afterward: its employees, armed with capital, experience and an unbreakable network, scattered to found or invest in companies that today dominate the technology landscape.

The Philosophy: Betting on the Impossible:

The “mafia” shared a creed: challenge the established order. Thiel summed it up in his famous line: “We wanted flying cars, instead we got 140 characters.” Their approach combined technical pragmatism with an almost messianic ambition:

  • Bold investing: Thiel was Facebook's first outside investor (2004), betting USD 500,000 for 10% of a college social network.
  • Radical disruption: Musk channeled his PayPal fortune into SpaceX and Tesla, challenging the aerospace and automotive industries.
  • Networks of trust: The PayPal alumni prioritized collaborating with one another. Rabois invested in Yelp, Sacks in Yammer, Hoffman in almost everything.

Their management style, forged in the chaos of PayPal, was intense and meritocratic. “It paid more for debates than for consensus,” Thiel once admitted. This culture of brutal discussions and fast execution became their trademark.

Controversies: The Dark Side of Disruption:

The “mafia” did not escape controversy. Thiel, a libertarian who funded the lawsuit that sank Gawker, and Musk, whose tweets have moved markets, embody the archetype of the techno-oligarch: brilliant, but disconnected from the social consequences of their power.

  • Centralization vs. democracy: while PayPal promised to empower individuals, companies such as Facebook (backed by Thiel) have been accused of eroding privacy and democracy.
  • Labor ethics: Musk's obsession with impossible goals at Tesla and SpaceX has drawn criticism for extreme working conditions.
  • Political influence: Hoffman, although a Democrat, has been questioned for using his fortune to fund technocratic campaigns.

The Legacy: Beyond Money:

Today, the “mafia's” influence is omnipresent:

  • Venture capitalism: firms such as Founders Fund (Thiel) or Valar Ventures (Hoffman) fund startups that challenge industries.
  • Startup culture: their model of “small teams, big impact” inspired generations of entrepreneurs.
  • Techno-utopian philosophy: their faith that technology can solve any problem —from climate change (Musk) to mortality (Thiel invests in anti-aging startups)— defines the ethos of Silicon Valley.

The Future: A New Generation?:

Although some members, such as Musk or Thiel, remain at the top, others have shifted to more discreet roles. Their network, however, persists: David O. Sacks now leads the contrarian movement in venture capital, while Luke Nosek, cofounder of Founders Fund, explores clean energy. The question is whether their model —a mix of genius, arrogance and tribal loyalty— can be replicated in a world where technology is no longer seen as an unquestionable force of progress.

Final Reflection: Heroes or Mercenaries?:

The “PayPal Mafia” embodies the central paradox of the technological age: they are pioneers who democratized access to services, but also architects of digital monopolies. Their story is not a tale of good guys and bad guys, but of how human ambition, when scaled with algorithms and capital, can build utopias and dystopias at the same time. In a world increasingly shaped by their creations, their legacy forces us to ask: do we want to live in the future they imagined?

Supplement: what Palantir is

Supplement II – Palantir.

Palantir: The Analytical Eye in the World of Data

In a universe flooded with information, where every click, transaction or sensor generates a digital trail, Palantir emerges as the architect of a global nervous system. Founded in 2003 by Peter Thiel —cofounder of PayPal— together with Alex Karp, Joe Lonsdale and others, this software company is not simply a technological tool, but a master key for deciphering hidden patterns in the chaos of data. Its name, inspired by the palantíri of The Lord of the Rings —mystical orbs that allowed one to see across space and time—, reflects its ambition: to turn scattered data into strategic clairvoyance.

The Foundations: From National Security to Business Revolution:

Palantir was born in a post-September 11 context, when U.S. intelligence agencies faced a paradox: they had millions of data points but lacked the ability to connect them. Its first platform, Gotham, was designed to solve this problem. Unlike traditional databases, Gotham integrated information from disparate sources —from financial records to encrypted communications— and visualized it on interactive maps where human analysts could detect terrorist threats or criminal networks. It was instrumental in operations such as the hunt for Osama bin Laden and the fight against financial fraud.

Over the years, Palantir expanded its reach beyond the government sphere. Its second flagship platform, Foundry, targets private companies, allowing giants such as Airbus, Merck or BP to integrate data from factories, supply chains and markets in real time. Imagine an airline that predicts mechanical failures before they happen, or a hospital that cross-references medical records with clinical trials to personalize treatments: that is the promise of Foundry.

The Technological Philosophy: Humans and Machines in Symbiosis:

What sets Palantir apart is not only its analytical power, but its hybrid approach. Unlike purely automated AI systems, its platforms are designed to enhance human intuition. An analyst can, for example, trace connections between data nodes that an algorithm would overlook, while the AI suggests alternative hypotheses based on predictive models. This marriage of human brain and machine has made Palantir an indispensable ally in critical missions, from tracking pandemics to optimizing logistics operations in modern wars.

Controversies and Ethical Dilemmas:

With great power comes great scrutiny. Palantir has been both praised and questioned. Its contracts with agencies such as ICE (U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement) have drawn criticism for its role in mass deportations. Human rights organizations warn that its technology could become an instrument of mass surveillance, eroding privacy. The company, for its part, insists that its tools are neutral: “We are a mirror,” says Karp, its CEO. “How they are used depends on those who look into it.”

The Future: From Digital Cold War to Civilian Innovation:

Today, Palantir is navigating ambitious waters. After going public in 2020, it seeks to diversify into sectors such as health —collaborating with the WHO to model disease outbreaks— or green energy, helping companies cut emissions through data analysis. Its bet on explainable Artificial Intelligence —systems whose decisions can be audited and understood— is an attempt to answer demands for transparency.

In a world where data is the new oil, Palantir is not just a company: it is a symptom of an era that demands translating information into action. Its story, woven between technological idealism and the shadow of power, reminds us that, in the battle to dominate the future, the question is not what these tools can see, but what we decide to do with what they reveal.

Manuela Battaglini Manrique de Lara (Arrecife, Lanzarote, 1974) is a Spanish‑Italian lawyer specializing in digital ethics, data protection and artificial intelligence governance. She earned her law degree at the University of La Laguna (1999) and, after working for several years in urban planning law, tax law and digital marketing, steered her career toward the intersection of law and technology. She is currently pursuing a doctorate in Artificial Intelligence at the Polytechnic University of Catalonia, focused on the social and democratic impact of algorithms.