California billionaires have spent a record $612 million on this year’s campaigns ahead of Tuesday’s congressional elections, and most of them do not declare affiliation with any political party, Politico reported.
According to the outlet’s analysis, there are more registered Democrats than Republicans among the state’s wealthiest residents, though political preferences in this group are more varied than among voters nationwide.
The American outlet identified 166 billionaires in California’s voter rolls. Of those, 36% are registered as Democrats, compared with 45% of all voters in the state. Unaffiliated voters make up 39% of the billionaires, while among all voters the figure is 23%. Republicans (22% of registered billionaires) are far less numerous in California than Democrats.
Billionaires who say they support Democrats include Mark Zuckerberg, head of Meta; Sam Altman, head of OpenAI; and Dario Amodei, founder of Anthropic. Those registered as Republicans include former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger; Joe Lacob, owner of the Golden State Warriors and Golden State Valkyries; and entrepreneur Palmer Luckey, a donor to Donald Trump.
“The data show that the situation is much more complex,” Republican political consultant Mike Murphy told Politico, referring to the stereotype that equates great wealth with support for Republicans.
The scale of the wealthiest donors’ financial involvement was unprecedented. Billionaire Tom Steyer spent more than $200 million on an unsuccessful campaign in the gubernatorial primary. More than $300 million went to a counter-campaign against a proposal for a one-time tax on the state’s wealthiest residents, led by Google co-founder Sergey Brin. Surgeon and inventor Gary Michelson also put up tens of millions of dollars.
More than 30 billionaires in the rolls live in San Francisco, and another 15 live in Los Angeles. More than 60% of the people in this wealth bracket identified by Politico voted in each of the last three presidential elections.
The outlet’s analysis indicates that although California billionaires more often back Democrats than Republicans, the largest group consists of people not formally affiliated with either of the two major parties.
On Tuesday, Americans will elect the entire House of Representatives and 35 of the 100 senators, as well as governors in 36 states. Polls indicate that Democrats are favored to take control of both chambers of Congress.
From New York, Andrzej Dobrowolski (PAP)
