{"id":22273,"date":"2026-03-12T05:37:25","date_gmt":"2026-03-12T04:37:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/2026\/03\/12\/california-billionaires-up-political-action-with-multimillion-dollar-donations\/"},"modified":"2026-03-12T05:37:25","modified_gmt":"2026-03-12T04:37:25","slug":"california-billionaires-up-political-action-with-multimillion-dollar-donations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/2026\/03\/12\/california-billionaires-up-political-action-with-multimillion-dollar-donations\/","title":{"rendered":"California billionaires up political action with multimillion-dollar donations"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Google founder backs both Republican and Democrat in governor\u2019s race while ex-CEO fights billionaire tax <\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/news\/2026\/feb\/17\/sign-up-for-the-breaking-news-us-email-to-get-newsletter-alerts-direct-to-your-inbox?utm_medium=ACQUISITIONS_STANDFIRST&amp;utm_campaign=BN22326&amp;utm_content=signup&amp;utm_term=standfirst&amp;utm_source=GUARDIAN_WEB\">Sign up for the Breaking News US email to get newsletter alerts in your inbox<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Tech billionaires are adding to their already huge spending spree on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/us-news\/california\">California<\/a> politics as campaigns for governor and a proposed wealth tax heat up. According to recently released campaign finance disclosures, big names pouring millions into state politics include current and former chief executives from Google, DoorDash, Reddit, LinkedIn and Facebook \u2013 evidence of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/technology\/silicon-valley\">Silicon Valley<\/a>\u2019s increasing involvement in politics.<\/p>\n<p>Google\u2019s former CEO <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/technology\/eric-schmidt\">Eric Schmidt<\/a> has become a major donor, contributing $1.04m to an independent committee, the California Business Roundtable, that is campaigning against the proposed Billionaire Tax Act, according to new <a href=\"https:\/\/cal-access.sos.ca.gov\/PDFGen\/pdfgen.prg?filingid=3124333&amp;amendid=0\">filings<\/a> released by the state government. The union-backed tax proposal, opposed by almost all of the state\u2019s mega-rich, aims to help cover education, food assistance and healthcare programs.<\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/us-news\/2026\/mar\/11\/silicon-valley-donations-california-governor-race\">Continue reading&#8230;<\/a><br \/>\n<img src=\"https:\/\/i.guim.co.uk\/img\/media\/e8451aafa7f20133c8078d6254b73e833c1479e0\/448_0_5000_4000\/master\/5000.jpg?width=140&amp;quality=85&amp;auto=format&amp;fit=max&amp;s=be97fa1d305855c536b1691b169edfbc\" title=\"California billionaires up political action with multimillion-dollar donations\" \/>Google founder backs both Republican and Democrat in governor\u2019s race while ex-CEO fights billionaire tax<br \/>\nSign up for the Breaking News US email to get newsletter alerts in your inbox<br \/>\nTech billionaires are adding to their already huge spending spree on California politics as campaigns for governor and a proposed wealth tax heat up. According to recently released campaign finance disclosures, big names pouring millions into state politics include current and former chief executives from Google, DoorDash, Reddit, LinkedIn and Facebook \u2013 evidence of Silicon Valley\u2019s increasing involvement in politics.<br \/>\nGoogle\u2019s former CEO Eric Schmidt has become a major donor, contributing $1.04m to an independent committee, the California Business Roundtable, that is campaigning against the proposed Billionaire Tax Act, according to new filings released by the state government. The union-backed tax proposal, opposed by almost all of the state\u2019s mega-rich, aims to help cover education, food assistance and healthcare programs. Continue reading&#8230;Technology | The Guardian<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Google founder backs both Republican and Democrat in governor\u2019s race while ex-CEO fights billionaire tax Sign up for the Breaking News US email to get newsletter alerts in your inbox Tech billionaires are adding to their already huge spending spree on California politics as campaigns for governor and a proposed wealth tax heat up. According &hellip;<\/p>\n<p class=\"read-more\"> <a class=\"\" href=\"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/2026\/03\/12\/california-billionaires-up-political-action-with-multimillion-dollar-donations\/\"> <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">California billionaires up political action with multimillion-dollar donations<\/span> Read More &raquo;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":22274,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22273"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22273"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22273\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22274"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22273"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22273"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22273"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}