You can, kinda.

I'm a very small government person. Far more libertarian than republican but the general republican obstructionism in government suits my ends so I like them better than democrats these days.

I'm "out" within my own smallish company. I'm in a very secure position there though and even if I wasn't, I'm not in a position where employment is a necessity for me at this point.

> lower taxes and smaller government, or if you are right leaning because you are a homophobic, racist

See, the problem here is that things I ascribe to being in the former category others will chose to ascribe my motivations to the latter. For example, the canonical example of the baker who refused to bake a cake for the gay wedding? I believe that private businesses should be left to their own devices with minimal government regulation, at least inversely proportional to their size/market share.

The baker who bakes cakes where you can just walk across/down the street to another one? If they chose to refuse to bake a cake for a gay wedding I'm not going there for a few reasons, besides me not wanting to patronize them they don't want me because I'm gay. I wouldn't patronize a bakery that wouldn't serve women (I'm a guy) or black people either (I'm white) because that doesn't align with my values, but, I don't think the government needs to (or should) inject it's morality into the free market. Most people would call me racist/homophobic because of it. As a gay man I'm shut out of most gay spaces because of having this opinion.

Similarly, and frankly worse, in tech. Tech people are a fun combination of so convinced that they are smarter than everyone else and so convinced that Their Way is The Correct Way and that anyone who disagrees is some form of -ist. In fairness, most tech people I meet are wicked smart but they are also myopic and don't always see the full spectrum.

I had an opportunity to join one of the FAANG companies last year at a seriously significant salary hike. I turned it down in large part because I knew I'd either have to constantly lie about my politics or refuse to answer and I've known others who have become labeled evil and complicit by virtue of refusing to answer the question. From asking some trusted friends on the inside about it, the group I was (possibly) joining wasn't nearly as bad as some others and I probably would have been fine never discussing politics, but, these things can change on a dime and I don't really want to hide. I spend all of my life up to college hiding in one closet, I'm not going back into another closet almost 30 years later.

It's a funny dynamic too, even though it's not open there are conservatives in tech in companies where you wouldn't expect, If we don't know who the others are we do a funny tiptoe around each other to identify (there's no secret handshake or code words unfortunately). We have to suss each other out very carefully. I remember when I was in a conversation with someone in my company and someone from a 3rd party vendor (I knew them both well, but, neither of them had ever spoken) and let slip something which I normally wouldn't say around others. My co-worker gave me laser eyes like "be more careful!" and I quickly responded to explain that Bob was cool.

So are conservatives in tech persecuted in the USA? IMO, absolutely.

Can you be openly right-leaning? For now, you can be, in the right circumstances, at the expense of either your career entirely or at the expense of limiting your career options drastically.

Where is it heading? Reeducation camps for wrong think.

If none of the above convinces you perhaps merely even the fact that this is a question which needs to be asked will give you some pause.