Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff has backtracked from comments supporting National Guard deployment to San Francisco.
"Having listened closely to my fellow San Franciscans and our local officials, and after the largest and safest Dreamforce in our history, I do not believe the National Guard is needed to address safety in San Francisco," Benioff said in a post on X, retracting his comments to the New York Times that supported the deployment of National Guard troops to San Francisco to assist with law and order.
"My earlier comment came from an abundance of caution around the event, and I sincerely apologize for the concern it caused.
"It's my firm belief that our city makes the most progress when we all work together in a spirit of partnership. I remain deeply grateful to Mayor [Daniel] Lurie, SFPD [the San Francisco Police Department], and all our partners, and am fully committed to a safer, stronger San Francisco," he said.
In an interview published on Oct. 10, Benioff told the Times: "We don't have enough cops, so if they can be cops, I'm all for it."
Salesforce is the largest private employer in the city, so his comments drew immediate attention and almost immediate condemnation from many people, including Emerson Collective founder and president Laurene Powell Jobs, who criticized Benioff in an opinion piece for The Wall Street Journal.
"That's the quiet corruption corroding modern philanthropy: the ability to give as a license to impose one's will," she wrote. "It's a kind of moral laundering, where so-called benevolence masks self-interest."
Fallout over Benioff's suggestion that the National Guard should be deployed to patrol San Francisco's streets intensified Wednesday, as District Attorney Brooke Jenkins — joined by Lurie and law enforcement leaders — firmly rejected the idea, calling such federal involvement unnecessary and unwelcome.
Speaking at a press conference outside the San Francisco Police Academy alongside Lurie and Sheriff Paul Miyamoto, Jenkins said the city is already taking strong action against crime.
Salesforce alumni, along with current employees and community members, published a letter criticizing Benioff's position and saying it represented "a troubling hypocrisy."
Conversely, some prominent conservatives supported Benioff's suggestion.
Among them was President Donald Trump.
He seemed to reference the idea while talking with reporters at the White House on Tuesday and said, "We have great support in San Francisco."
He told FBI Director Kash Patel to put the city next in line for positioning troops.
Jim Mishler ✉
Jim Mishler, a seasoned reporter, anchor and news director, has decades of experience covering crime, politics and environmental issues.
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