U.S House of Representatives Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi took shots at Apple CEO Tim Cook for participating in a GOP fundraiser in Silicon Valley this week.
Pelosi, who represents the nearby 12th district of California, called Cook “naive” for helping House Speaker Paul Ryan raise money for her rivals in the GOP, especially after the company just broke off its support for the GOP convention.
“Everybody has the right to do whatever they want to do,” Pelosi told SF Gate. “But when they say, ‘We don’t like what Trump says, but we’ll donate to his party,’ they’re either naive or they think we’re naive.”
Tim Cook’s GOP fundraiser with Paul Ryan is being co-hosted by Apple VP & Treasurer Gary Wipfler in Menlo Park, California today. The private breakfast was announced just days after Apple decided to not donate cash and technology to the GOP convention due to Donald Trump’s vitriolic remarks about immigrants, minorities and women.
Any cash Tim Cook raises could be bad news for Pelosi. The congresswoman is up for reelection this year, though she doesn’t have a problem raising an enormous amount of cash herself, which she also spreads to other Democrat campaigns.
The fundraiser may hurt ties between Apple and the San Francisco District representative. Cook has a history of meeting with both Republicans and Democrat lawmakers, but Pelosi suggested he sucks at politics.
“Poor Tim. What a nice guy he is, but somebody gave him bad advice,” she said. “He probably doesn’t think that much about politics.”
