{"id":47883,"date":"2026-04-24T12:18:37","date_gmt":"2026-04-24T19:18:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/?p=47883"},"modified":"2026-04-24T12:18:38","modified_gmt":"2026-04-24T19:18:38","slug":"bernie-sanders-group-makes-surprise-endorsement-in-california-gov-race","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/2026\/04\/24\/bernie-sanders-group-makes-surprise-endorsement-in-california-gov-race\/","title":{"rendered":"Bernie Sanders group makes surprise endorsement in California gov. race"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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California gubernatorial candidate Tom Steyer is trying hard to get voters to look past his previous investments in coal and private prisons.David Crane\/MediaNews Group\/Los Angeles Daily News via Getty Images<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By\u00a0Anabel Sosa<\/a>,\u00a0Lester Black<\/a><\/strong> April 23, 2026 (SFGate.com)<\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tom Steyer\u2019s resume sounds like a progressive\u2019s worst nightmare:\u00a0a private equity billionaire<\/a>\u00a0who invested in coal and private prisons now using his personal fortune to buy public office.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yet Steyer has managed to win over far-left groups and rise to the top of the crowded pack of Democrats in this year\u2019s governor\u2019s race.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Steyer\u00a0has consistently been leading<\/a>\u00a0among the Democratic candidates in polling for the past month, and the businessman has recently won several key endorsements, including from major climate and labor unions. The progressive group Our Revolution backed the businessman Monday, and former state Controller\u00a0Betty Yee endorsed Steyer<\/a>\u00a0on Tuesday after she ended her own gubernatorial campaign.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our Revolution, which was founded by Bernie Sanders and vehemently opposes billionaires\u2019 involvement in politics, defended its endorsement<\/a> by saying Steyer is working \u201cto challenge the very system that benefits people like him.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The endorsements won\u2019t hand Steyer the race, but they are the clearest sign yet that Steyer may be successfully shedding his venture capital baggage. <\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n

Steyer\u00a0has spent the past six years\u00a0arguing that he\u2019s a good billionaire<\/a>\u00a0and that his current policy positions, including his support this year of a\u00a0wealth tax<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0single-payer health care<\/a>\u00a0in California, speak louder than his previous actions. He\u2019s even framed his previous massive investments as the reason he got into politics. The businessman invoked the Bible when asked by SFGATE in February about his previous investment in for-profit prisons, saying the experience spurred him into public service.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cIt was a wake-up call for me,\u201d Steyer said. \u201cShould I be doing this job? I mean, there\u2019s a reason that I walked away from my business. There\u2019s a reason that I walked away from all that money.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From Manhattan to SF hedge fund<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Steyer grew up on the Upper East Side of Manhattan and graduated from Yale in 1979. He moved to California to get his MBA at Stanford, and then in 1986, he co-founded his own hedge fund, Farallon Capital, headquartered in San Francisco. \u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He managed Farallon for nearly three decades before his pivot into politics. During that time, the company invested in a wide range of industries, including many that have gone on to haunt his political career, like Farallon\u2019s involvement in an Australian coal mine deal worth hundreds of millions of dollars, according to the New York Times<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n

Then there\u2019s Farrallon\u2019s 2004 and 2005 investment in the nation\u2019s largest for-profit prison contractor, Corrections Corporation of America, now named CoreCivic. This investment has drawn perhaps the most controversy. The firm invested nearly $90 million in the company, which currently owns an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Kern County \u2014 the state\u2019s largest ICE detention center. That facility is now at capacity and has been described as having<\/a> \u201cinhumane\u201d living conditions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Steyer was criticized nearly as soon as Farrallon made the investment. In 2004, a Yale union demanded that the university divest from Farallon for its link to private prisons. Steyer initially responded in 2004 by writing a letter to Yale\u2019s students saying, \u201cWe are proud of the work we have done, and continue to do,\u201d\u00a0according to Politico<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Farrallon sold the prison stock in 2006, and Steyer stepped down<\/a> from the firm and sold his ownership stake in 2012. But his time at Farrallon made him incredibly wealthy. He is worth an estimated $2.4 billion, according to Forbes<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n

In a TV ad that his campaign started<\/a> airing this month, he is shown at what is depicted as a town hall responding to a question about his CoreCivic investment. He says nearly the same thing he told SFGATE in February: \u201cIt was a wake-up call. I felt like I was not going to be living my values the way I wanted to.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Decades of apologies<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Steyer quickly transitioned from businessman to philanthropist and Democratic mega-donor after he left his private equity job. By 2014, he had already given $75 million to various causes, and he\u2019s gone on to spend hundreds of millions of dollars on electing liberals across the country. He\u2019s also poured cash into progressive causes, especially environmental protections, making that the centerpiece of his 2020 presidential campaign.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n

Despite his willingness to spend his own money on Democrats, Farallon Capital\u2019s investment in the private prison company has long been a thorn in Steyer\u2019s side. Former President Joe Biden, his Democratic opponent in the 2020 primary, accused the businessman during a debate of investing in prisons that had \u201chog-tied young men<\/a>.\u201d Steyer responded by saying he had sold the stock and has since worked to end private prisons in California.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Steyer\u2019s investment record didn\u2019t become a much bigger issue in his presidential primary campaign, likely because it ended before he won a single state primary. But as his name rose in California\u2019s crowded gubernatorial race last year, Democratic rivals like former Rep. Katie Porter\u00a0have attacked him for<\/a>\u00a0profiting off the allegedly inhumane facilities and accused him of being hypocritical for attacking ICE after having invested in its detention centers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

X post: https:\/\/x.com\/katieporterca\/status\/2044491721413947572?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E2044491721413947572%7Ctwgr%5E6585d092d4c90de3b893f6d7b95c35e0b01ae580%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.sfgate.com%2Fpolitics%2Farticle%2Ftom-steyer-billionaire-calif-governor-22221062.php<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In addition to his \u201cwake-up call\u201d line, Steyer has responded by\u00a0touting his past support<\/a>\u00a0for criminal justice reform, including lobbying for a policy to\u00a0end cash bail<\/a>, a collaborative effort with then-Assemblymember Rob Bonta, now serving as the state\u2019s attorney general.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These admissions are perhaps what it takes for a billionaire to make voters \u2014 at least Democratic ones \u2014 comfortable with his financial past. Steyer has also promoted progressive policy ideas like dismantling the PG&E monopoly<\/a>, banning social media<\/a> use for minors under 16, and supporting single-payer health care<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since he jumped into the governor\u2019s race in November, he\u2019s been endorsed<\/a> by Smart Justice California, a progressive criminal justice advocacy organization, and Courage California, another progressive group, which specifically cited Steyer\u2019s vision<\/a> for \u201cabolishing ICE.\u201d Assemblymembers Isaac Bryan, Lola Smallwood-Cuevas and Mia Bonta \u2014 all members of the Legislature who have sponsored high-impact prison reform bills in recent years \u2014 have also endorsed him. <\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n

Still, the Democratic field remains overcrowded. Steyer has maintained his place at the top, but\u00a0a recent surge for rival candidate Xavier Becerra<\/a>, the former health secretary in the Biden administration, shows that Steyer could yet again burn nine figures on a failed campaign.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the end, Steyer says the prison investment was what pushed him into politics. In the February interview with SFGATE at this year\u2019s California Democratic Convention, Steyer invoked the biblical story of Paul\u2019s conversion to a follower of Jesus Christ to explain his transformation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cFor those of you who are familiar with the story of Damascus, when Paul was crossing the bridge as the strongest opponent of Christ, and on the road to Damascus, he decided he was the strongest backer of Christ. So at some point,\u201d he said, \u201cI just decided this is not for me.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

More Politics<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2014 Newsom is touring Southern states. It’s exposing some hurdles in his path to 2028.<\/a>
\u2014 Latest Calif. governor’s poll brings unexpected Democrat to top<\/a>
\u2014 Leading SF tech lab in standoff with Pete Hegseth<\/a>
\u2014 The biggest problem for California Democrats just revealed itself in San Francisco<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

April 23, 2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n

Anabel Sosa<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Senior California politics reporter<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Anabel Sosa is the senior California politics reporter at SFGATE. She previously covered the statehouse and elections for the Los Angeles Times. She has a masters degree in investigative journalism from UC Berkeley. You can reach her at anabel.sosa@sfgate.com.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n

Lester Black<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

News editor<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lester Black is a news editor at SFGATE. He has written for FiveThirtyEight.com, High Country News, The Guardian, The Albuquerque Journal and The Tennessean. He previously worked at The Stranger and the Clarksville Leaf-Chronicle.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

California gubernatorial candidate Tom Steyer is trying hard to get voters to look past his previous investments in coal and private prisons.David Crane\/MediaNews Group\/Los Angeles Daily News via Getty Images By\u00a0Anabel Sosa,\u00a0Lester Black April 23, 2026 (SFGate.com) Tom Steyer\u2019s resume sounds like a progressive\u2019s worst nightmare:\u00a0a private equity billionaire\u00a0who invested… Continue reading → <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47883"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47883"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47883\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":47885,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47883\/revisions\/47885"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47883"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47883"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47883"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}