Nicole Shanahan facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Nicole Shanahan
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Shanahan in 2024
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Nicole Ann Shanahan
September 26, 1985 |
| Education | University of Puget Sound (BA) Santa Clara University (JD) |
| Political party | Independent (2024–present) |
| Spouse(s) | |
| Children | 1 |
Nicole Ann Shanahan (born September 26, 1985) is an American lawyer and businesswoman. She is known for her work in Silicon Valley and her support for different causes. In 2024, she was the running mate for Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in his independent presidential campaign.
Shanahan was born in California. She studied at the University of Puget Sound and later earned a law degree from Santa Clara University. Before becoming a lawyer, she worked with patents, which are legal rights for inventions. She also worked at Stanford Law School's CodeX, which focuses on how technology and law connect.
In 2018, she married Google co-founder Sergey Brin. They later separated in 2021 and divorced in 2023. She is reported to have a lot of wealth, mainly from her marriage. In 2019, she started a foundation called Bia-Echo. This foundation supports research to help women have children later in life. In March 2024, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. chose Shanahan as his running mate. Shanahan has also shared concerns about the safety of vaccines.
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Early Life and Education
Nicole Shanahan grew up in Oakland, California. She has described her childhood as difficult. Her mother, who was born in China, worked hard as a maid before becoming an accountant.
Shanahan first attended Saint Mary's College of California. Then she moved to Washington state. There, she earned a bachelor's degree from the University of Puget Sound. She studied subjects like Asian cultures, economics, and Mandarin Chinese. Before going to law school, she worked as a paralegal. She also worked as a patent specialist at a company called RPX Corp..
Career and Business Ventures
While studying law, Shanahan was an exchange student in Singapore. She became very interested in patent law, which deals with protecting new inventions. After becoming a lawyer, she started her own legal technology company called ClearAccessIP. She was the CEO of this company, which was based in Palo Alto, California. In 2020, she sold her company to a competitor.
Shanahan has talked about how artificial intelligence (AI) is changing the legal world. She was a fellow at Stanford Law School's CodeX. This center explores how technology can be used in law.
She has also been an executive producer for films. These include Kiss The Ground and Evolver. She is also a member of the board for several companies and organizations. These include Carbon Royalty Corp., Linus Biotechnology, and Extreme Tech Challenge. She is also the "Global Joy Officer" for the Sloomoo Institute.
Bia-Echo Foundation and Advocacy
In 2018, Nicole Shanahan helped start a center at the Buck Institute for Research on Aging. This center focuses on helping women's reproductive health as they get older.
In 2019, she created her own foundation, Bia-Echo. The name "Bia" comes from an ancient Greek goddess of energy. For several years, her former husband, Sergey Brin, was the main donor to Bia-Echo. He gave more than $20 million to the foundation.
In 2019, Shanahan promised to give $100 million through Bia-Echo over five years. Most of this money is for "reproductive longevity" research. This research aims to help women have children later in life. She supports new ideas that might allow women to have children into their 50s.
In 2023, Shanahan said that finding a "cure to autism" was another main goal for Bia-Echo. She spends a lot of her time researching autism. In 2022, she also gave $70 million to Blue Meridian Partners. This group gives money to charities that help people who are struggling financially.
Political Involvement Before 2024
In the 2010s and 2020s, Nicole Shanahan gave money to many left-leaning groups and Democratic politicians. She supported Hillary Clinton's 2016 presidential campaign and Ro Khanna's campaigns for Congress. In 2020, she was a big supporter of Measure J. This was a vote in Los Angeles County about changes to the justice system. She also gave money to support George Gascón's campaign for District Attorney in Los Angeles County.
During the 2020 Democratic presidential primaries, she supported candidates like Marianne Williamson and Pete Buttigieg. She even helped host a fundraiser for Buttigieg. After Joe Biden became the likely Democratic candidate, she supported his campaign. She gave money to the Biden Victory Fund and the Democratic National Committee.
Role in Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s Campaign
Early Support
In May 2023, when Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was running for the Democratic presidential nomination, Shanahan donated the most allowed amount to his campaign. When Kennedy decided to run as an independent in October 2023, Shanahan was initially disappointed. She said she would not support him. However, in early 2024, she changed her mind and began supporting him again.
Through a company called Planeta Management LLC, Shanahan donated $4 million to a group that supported Kennedy. This money paid for a 30-second TV ad during the Super Bowl. The total cost of the ad was very high. Kennedy said his campaign was not directly involved with the ad. This is because campaigns and independent groups are not allowed to work together directly. Shanahan also donated half a million dollars to another group supporting Kennedy.
Vice-Presidential Running Mate
In March 2024, Kennedy's campaign confirmed that Shanahan was being considered as his running mate. On March 26, 2024, Kennedy officially announced Shanahan as his choice for vice president. This happened at an event in Oakland, California. When she joined the campaign, Shanahan left the Democratic Party. Her ability to help fund the campaign was seen as a big advantage.
Shanahan was one of the wealthiest people to run for vice president in many years. She gave almost $19 million to the Kennedy/Shanahan campaign. This was a small part of her total wealth. Even with her contributions, the campaign struggled to raise enough money.
By August 2024, the Kennedy/Shanahan campaign had managed to get on the ballot in only 16 of the 50 states. This meant they could only get 140 of the 538 electoral votes. Some wealthy Republican donors helped the campaign get on the ballot in certain states. The campaign tried different ways to get on the ballot. For example, they tried to work with smaller political parties.
During their campaign, Shanahan and Kennedy sometimes had different ideas. In May 2024, Shanahan suggested the campaign aimed to force a special election in the House of Representatives. Kennedy disagreed with this idea. Shanahan did not often appear at campaign events or give interviews. Her first solo appearance was a month and a half after she was named running mate.
On August 20, 2024, Shanahan said in an interview that the Kennedy campaign had talked with the Trump campaign. She said she and Kennedy were thinking about leaving the race and joining forces with Trump. She felt their campaign could not win the election. She also thought they might take votes away from Trump, which could help Kamala Harris. Kennedy and Shanahan stopped their campaign two days later and supported Trump.
On August 27, 2024, Shanahan was interviewed on NewsNation. She clearly stated that she is not a Trump Republican.
Political Views
In interviews in 2024, Shanahan said she is "not against vaccines." However, she supported Kennedy's views on vaccines. She questioned the scientific agreement on how safe and effective vaccines are. After being chosen as Kennedy's running mate, she mentioned ideas that have been disproven. She suggested that childhood vaccines might cause autism. This idea has been promoted by Kennedy for years but is not supported by science. On X (formerly Twitter), she shared incorrect information about COVID-19 vaccines, saying they were unsafe.
Shanahan believes that "electromagnetic pollution" from phones and other devices is causing many long-term illnesses. She thinks Kennedy was the only presidential candidate who took this issue seriously. She also criticized the Biden administration for giving military help to Ukraine. She named Thomas Massie, a Republican U.S. Representative, as one of her favorite members of Congress.
Personal Life
In 2014, Nicole Shanahan married Jeremy Asher Kranz. He is an investor and finance executive. They divorced in 2015.
Shanahan met Sergey Brin, a co-founder of Google, at a yoga festival in 2014. They married in 2018. They have one daughter, who was born in 2018. They owned a home in Malibu, California.
Shanahan and Brin separated in December 2021. Brin filed for divorce in January 2022. They had signed a prenuptial agreement before marrying. During the divorce, Shanahan's lawyers argued she signed it under pressure. She sought a large amount of money from Brin's wealth. Their divorce was finalized in 2023. Reports suggest Shanahan received a significant amount of wealth from the divorce. The New York Times reported she has over $1 billion in wealth, mostly from her marriage to Brin.
In 2023, Shanahan had a "love ceremony" with Jacob Strumwasser. He works at a Bitcoin software company. She described it as a handfasting ceremony, which is a traditional way to commit to someone. They met at the Burning Man festival in 2022.
