Senator Warner attended the annual South by Southwest (SXSW) technology conference in Texas this weekend to promote his bipartisan Startup Act 3.0 legislation, and to meet with innovators, entrepreneurs and tech industry professionals. 

 “It doesn’t make any sense for a mathematician or engineer to graduate from Kansas State with a PHD, get job offers everywhere, and end up working in Vancouver because our immigration rules prohibit him staying in Kansas,” Senator Warner told CNN about the Startup Act 3.0, which removes legal barriers to high-skilled immigrants working and starting businesses in America. “We’ve got enormous assets in America in terms of universities and access to capital. We’ve got to win the talent war as well.”

On a series of panels and in conversations with SXSW attendees, Senator Warner also spoke about his push to promote crowdfunding, a new way for entrepreneurs and startup businesses to attract capital over the internet from large numbers of small investors.

While regulation will be needed to prevent abuse, crowdfunding has tremendous potential to help new businesses get off the ground, said Senator Warner.  “The promise of the internet to democratize the world… has worked in major communities, but a whole lot of rural America and mid-sized America is getting left behind,” he said.  “Crowdfunding could help change that.”