Silicon Valley built an app to beat Trump where it matters

Silicon Valley has signed petitions against Donald Trump. It is also writing checks and telling employees that it’s important to vote. But so far the brightest minds in tech haven’t deployed much in the way of ... tech to defeat the Republican nominee. Amit Kumar says he wants to try, with a mobile app designed to rally votes against Trump where it matters: In swing states.

Kumar is CEO of Trimian, a sort-of-stealth company that is building networking apps for groups like college alumni. But in August he built #NeverTrump, an app that’s supposed to tell mobile users about people they know in battleground states, so they can reach out to them and ask them to vote. If you want, #NeverTrump will do the asking, too, with pre-programmed messages it will send up to four times before the election. It’s an explicit acknowledgement that Silicon Valley workers’ votes won’t have any impact on the electoral college, since California is already a lock for Hillary Clinton.