Sam Altman is grappling with his political alignment. The 40-year-old CEO of OpenAI, like many of his fellow tech executives in recent years, has expressed that he does not feel at home in the Democratic Party or the Republican Party. In an extended post on X, Altman lamented the fact that he’s now “politically homeless” and yearns for a technocratic utopia—something his once friend and current rival Elon Musk has also been calling for with his push to form a third party. Hmm…interesting timing, yeah?
Altman, who claimed in his post that he’s “not big on identities,” mapped his political evolution over the last couple decades—or rather, how political parties have evolved to move away from him. “The world should get richer every year through science and technology, but everyone has to be in the ‘up elevator,’” he wrote. He also articulated his beliefs that free markets are more efficient than government, that innovation and entrepreneurship are important, and that education is key to America maintaining its edge. Pretty traditional libertarian fare, frankly.
“I believed this when I was 20, when I was 30, and now I am 40 and still believe it. The Democratic party seemed reasonably aligned with it when I was 20, losing the plot when I was 30, and completely to have moved somewhere else at this point. So now I am politically homeless. But that’s fine; I care much, much more about being American than any political party,” Altman wrote.
I’m not big on identities, but I am extremely proud to be American. This is true every day, but especially today—I firmly believe this is the greatest country ever on Earth. The American miracle stands alone in world history.
I believe in techno-capitalism. We should encourage…
— Sam Altman (@sama) July 4, 2025
Altman, a billionaire, said that he’s more interested in candidates who want to “make everyone have the stuff billionaires have instead of how they are going to eliminate billionaires.” And it’s clear that he thinks the route to that outcome is techno-capitalism, an ideology that he explicitly endorses in the post. “We should encourage people to make tons of money and then also find ways to widely distribute wealth and share the compounding magic of capitalism.”
As Altman seeks a home for his capitalist utopia, a vision where markets purportedly redistribute wealth rather than allowing a select few like Altman to hoard it (he does know he can just give his away if he wants, right?), his former OpenAI co-founder Elon Musk has returned to dabbling with the formation of a third party. This push is spurred by Musk’s ongoing opposition to President Donald Trump’s “One Big, Beautiful Bill,” which he argues will add to the deficit.
“Independence Day is the perfect time to ask if you want independence from the two-party (some would say uniparty) system! Should we create the America Party?” Musk asked on X. He’s been kicking around this “America Party” idea for about a month now, claiming that it will represent the “80 percent in the middle” whom he believes are currently without sufficient representation from Republicans or Democrats. The origin of that 80% figure is unclear. A Pew Research poll, for example, found that 25% of people say neither party represents them, 37% wished there were more political parties to choose from, and 26% believed more parties would help solve the country’s problems.
Independence Day is the perfect time to ask if you want independence from the two-party (some would say uniparty) system!
Should we create the America Party?
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 4, 2025
It’s also worth noting that while Musk claims his “America Party” would represent a majority of people, he hasn’t really issued any policy positions or founding principles for the party. Presumably, it’d have a fair amount of overlap with Altman’s general libertarian-leaning beliefs, which often framed as “common sense” ideologies. According to Politico, fellow tech bro Andrew Yang has reached out to Musk to push a third-party collaboration, potentially using his “non-partisan” Forward Party as a model.
Frankly, you’d be hard pressed to find a single issue that 80% of Americans all agree on, let alone enough of them to serve as the foundation of a political party. But having a party of their own would certainly make it more straightforward for the Musks and Altmans of the world to push their preferred interests. Of course, they’d have to settle their own disagreements first.
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