My name is [insert name] and I am a member of the King County community. I am emailing you because I am concerned about your selection of Brad Smith, the President and Vice Chairman at Microsoft, as Co-chair of your transition committee and I am asking you to remove and replace him.
Microsoft’s business practices do not align with KC’s core values nor our moral and legal commitment to protecting our migrant, refugee and other vulnerable communities. Microsoft is profiting from and complicit in the genocide in Gaza, providing data storage to the Israeli military for mass surveillance throughout Palestine and facilitating Israel’s indiscriminate air strikes on Palestinian civilians. These ceaseless violations of international law are well documented by the United Nations, the International Court of Justice and other international NGO’s and human rights organizations, like Amnesty International. Employees of Microsoft in our KC community who have called for Microsoft to cut ties with this genocide have only been largely ignored and some fired, despite our international legal requirements to end genocide and punish those responsible.
Microsoft has also been complicit in Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) increasingly violent attacks and illegal kidnapping and deporting of migrants, profiting from an over $19 million contract providing ICE with data processing and AI capabilities to surveil and terrorize our neighbors. King County is prohibited from the use of our resources for immigration enforcement and obligated to promote equity, fairness and inclusion and provide access to services for all residents, including migrants, under KCC 2.15. We cannot uphold this standard under leadership that enables this ongoing and irreversible harm.
Finally, Microsoft, along with other big tech and large corporations in our community, actively lobby against a wealth tax in Washington State, that would raise billions of dollars for necessary public services and help close funding gaps in the budget. Washington State has the second most regressive tax code in our country, placing most of its burden on low- and middle-income residents, not the most wealthy. This is all while our communities are in a state of housing crisis, low-income families struggle more and more to make ends meet, and the State makes cuts to funding, including for behavioral health services, the Dept of Children, Youth and Families, higher education and health care. These cuts all come at a time when our communities safety nets and rights are all under attack by our federal administration and legislatures.
Microsoft clearly puts profits over community safety and international human rights. In this state of emergency in our communities we don’t need to prop up the voices of those who have always profited within, and because of, our violent systems. We need new voices that represent our diverse communities and policies that center equity, community health and safety, and that benefit those most vulnerable in our county. I, and our KC community, ask that you do not platform Microsoft's president Brad Smith in your transition into your role as King County Executive. Too many in our community have not, and have never, benefitted from the wealth of our county and we can no longer afford business as usual.
Sincerely,
[insert signature(s)]
