Robert Mercer
American computer scientist, businessman and funder of right-wing causes / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Robert Leroy Mercer (born July 11, 1946)[2] is an American hedge fund manager, computer scientist, and political donor. Mercer was an early artificial intelligence researcher and developer and is the former co-CEO of the hedge fund company Renaissance Technologies.[2][3][4]
Robert Mercer | |
|---|---|
| Born | Robert Leroy Mercer (1946-07-11) July 11, 1946 (age 77) San Jose, California, U.S.G |
| Education | University of New Mexico, Albuquerque (BS) University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign (MS, PhD) |
| Spouse | Diana Dean[1] |
| Children | Rebekah, Jennifer, and Heather Sue |
Mercer played a key role in the campaign for the United Kingdom to leave the European Union by donating data analytics services to Nigel Farage.[5] He has also been a major funder of organizations supporting right-wing political causes in the United States, such as Breitbart News,[6] the now-defunct Cambridge Analytica,[7] and Donald Trump's 2016 campaign for president.[8] He is the principal benefactor of the Make America Number 1 super PAC.[9]
In November 2017, Mercer announced he would step down from Renaissance Technologies and sell his stake in Breitbart News to his daughters.[10] He was the majority owner of SCL Group, a self-described "global elections management agency",[11] before it was dissolved in 2018.[3] In 2021, Mercer was involved in possibly the largest tax settlement in U.S. history, as he, James Simons, and other executives at the hedge fund Renaissance Technologies were ordered to pay as much as $7 billion to the IRS in back taxes.[12]