Sen Rand Paul Talks About Appealing to Young People on Tech Issues

In a speech in San Francisco (CA), Presidential candidate Sen Rand Paul (R-KY) told Silicon Valley conservatives that he could win over Californians and other voters not normally associated with the Republican Party largely on issues of civil liberties and technology. At the Disrupting Democracy speaker series hosted by Lincoln Labs, a tech-friendly conservative organization, Sen Paul made the case for appealing to younger voters by way of ending mass data collection, an activity he said went against one of the main reasons young people voted for Barack Obama in 2008. "I also think people who voted for President Obama was because they thought he was a civil libertarian," Sen Paul said.

The speech was part of Sen Paul's message of reaching to nontraditional GOP voters. Sen Paul made the case that criminal justice reform could be a way to appeal to voters, noting that the Republican Party often touts itself as the party of the Second Amendment. "I want to also be the party of the First Amendment, the Fourth Amendment but also the Fifth and Sixth Amendment," Sen Paul said. As part of this, Sen Paul talked about restoring the right to vote for convicted felons. Sen Paul also held firm to his opposition to network neutrality, saying he had not seen concerns about Internet monopolies that could control rates being manifested. "I don't think there is yet evidence that there's absolute control of rates," adding if there was any organization involved with monopolies, it was government monopolies. He also dismissed the idea that it would make it harder for small startup companies to succeed. "The government didn't create Facebook and the government didn't create Google," he said.