Tom Steyer has built his California gubernatorial campaign on a message that would seem almost absurd coming from almost anyone else: the ultra-wealthy should pay far more in taxes. That he happens to have a net worth of $2.4 billion does not, in his telling, disqualify him from making that argument. It makes him credible.
The hedge fund founder turned climate activist and mega-donor frames himself as a different kind of billionaire, one willing to turn on his own class. At a recent campaign event in East Los Angeles, wearing a baseball cap embroidered with the words "class traitor," Steyer told reporters that Americans are right to be skeptical of the ultra-wealthy. "I'm skeptical of billionaires because we've seen so many billionaires being selfish and arrogant," he said.
Steyer's candidacy arrives at a politically volatile moment. A Harris Poll from last year found that 53 percent of Americans believe billionaires threaten democracy, up 7 points from 2024. Yet nearly eight in 10 respondents said they would be more likely to support a billionaire who challenges unjust systems. In this environment, Steyer is testing whether Democrats will embrace a populist from the 1 percent.
The appetite for anti-establishment wealth criticism runs deep across the political landscape. Senator Bernie Sanders has been touring the country on his "Fighting Oligarchy" tour. In New York, newly elected democratic socialist mayor Zohran Mamdani filmed a tax proposal video outside billionaire Ken Griffin's $238 million penthouse on tax day. Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez ignited debate by declaring that no one can legitimately earn a billion dollars.
California, which boasts the world's fourth-largest economy and more billionaires than any other U.S. state, faces an acute affordability crisis. Rent, utilities, and groceries have become crushing burdens for millions of residents. Working-class voters are searching for a governor who will confront not just the billionaire in the White House but the billionaire class itself.
Lorena Gonzalez, president of the California Federation of Labor Unions, expressed the sentiment bluntly. "There's no question that we think working people represent working people best," she said. But she added: "If there is a billionaire who says, 'I will take on this entire system,' shit, all right, let's see." Her union endorsed Steyer alongside other candidates including former congresswoman Katie Porter and former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa.
Steyer is not alone in testing whether Democrats will back wealthy progressives. Illinois Governor JB Pritzker, heir to the Hyatt hotel fortune, is running for a third term and is widely believed to be eyeing a 2028 presidential bid. In San Francisco, tech entrepreneur Saikat Chakrabarti, formerly chief of staff to Ocasio-Cortez, is self-funding a campaign to succeed retiring House Speaker Nancy Pelosi with an explicitly anti-establishment message. San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie, an heir to the Levi Strauss fortune, governs with strong approval ratings despite his moderate, technocratic approach.
The Democratic Party has a long history of elevating affluent leaders who framed their privilege as public responsibility. Franklin D. Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy, and other pillars of the party emerged from privilege. As populism scholar Cas Mudde noted, socialist movements have historically been "led by 'class traitors'" or supported rich intellectuals like Bernie Sanders and Noam Chomsky.
Yet Steyer faces real attacks on his wealth accumulation. At a debate, Katie Porter attacked him over his hedge fund's past investments in polluters and immigrant detention facilities. "He's a billionaire who got rich off polluters and ICE prisons and is now using that money to fund this election," Porter said.
Steyer counters that self-funding his campaign means he "can't be bought." On the trail, he emphasizes that while he is the only billionaire on the ballot, he is "not the only billionaire in this race," pointing to corporate and tech money flowing against him. His campaign message centers on his support for the state's proposed "billionaire" wealth tax, which has drawn opposition from Silicon Valley's richest leaders. Representative Ro Khanna endorsed him despite representing the nation's wealthiest congressional district. Even the California Democratic Socialists of America, which acknowledges billionaires represent "a policy failure," endorsed Steyer as "somehow" the most progressive candidate in the race.
Since launching seven months ago, Steyer has spent more than $132 million of his own money saturating airwaves and paying social media influencers to boost his candidacy. His spending dwarfs that of rivals.
Self-funded campaigns, however, have a dismal track record. Steyer himself lost a 2020 presidential bid. Michael Bloomberg spent $1 billion running for president that same year and won exactly one primary: American Samoa.
"If you have a vast amount of personal wealth, you have cleared one of the biggest hurdles," said Michael Beckel, director of money and politics reform at Issue One. "But at the end of the day, voters must also like a politician's platform and ideas."
At Steyer's "A California You Can Afford" tour stop in East LA, complete with free tacos and face painting, some voters appeared receptive. Duane Paul Murphy, 30, from the San Fernando Valley, said plainly: "If it takes a billionaire who wants to be taxed more and wants to use that money to help people, then at this point, he's our guy."
Carla Ramirez, 66, who drove from the Antelope Valley to hear Steyer speak, expressed deep alarm about wealth concentration in America. She wants bold change from California's next governor, the kind she sees New York's Mayor Mamdani attempting. Yet by evening's end, she remained uncertain whether California should be governed by a billionaire, even one promising to tax himself.
Author James Rodriguez: "Steyer's gamble is audacious, but voters rewarding his self-awareness about class doesn't erase the fundamental tension: can anyone born into or who accumulated that kind of wealth ever truly represent working people's interests, or is he just the latest iteration of noblesse oblige politics?"
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