After Silicon Valley spending spree, more moderate Democrats are heading to the Capitol

In summary

New tech-backed super PACs spent tens of millions of dollars boosting some Democrats over their more progressive opponents. Almost all of their favored candidates won their contests, despite voters’ broad distrust of AI and billionaires.

In April, Ada Briceño felt confident she’d win one of the top two spots in the Assembly District 67 primary race to represent parts of Orange and L.A. counties. The labor leader and former hotel worker had endorsements from the California Democratic Party, the Working Families Party and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders. Internal polling showed she was solidly ahead of her closest Democratic competitor, Cerritos city councilmember Mark Pulido. 

Then the money started flowing. 

Between April 9 and the June 2 primary, special interests groups spent $9.2 million attacking Briceño and raising Pulido’s profile, with the majority coming from Airbnb, Meta, Google and cryptocurrency billionaire Chris Larsen. Pulido’s campaign spent another $600,000. Two regional cardrooms spent $500,000 to support Briceño, but her campaign couldn’t compete. 

“He made it past the primary because of the $10 million that was spent against me. Absolutely,” Briceño said of Pulido. Pulido’s campaign did not respond to a direct message on social media or an emailed request for comment.

Pulido is part of a wave of at least nine business-backed Democrats who will be going to the Capitol after Silicon Valley companies and investors spent at least $50 million on races, much of it to help moderates triumph over more progressive, union-backed opponents. The nation’s blue wave extended to kicking several Republican incumbents out of their statehouse seats. But the backlash against billionaire spending did not extend to legislative races in California, despite the efforts of candidates and critics of tech spending to point it out.

Tech funders make gains

Grow California, a new independent expenditure committee principally funded by Larsen and venture capitalist Tim Draper, and California Leads, funded mostly by Meta and Google, spent $24 million and $17 million respectively backing moderate Democrats over more left-leaning Democrats. The two groups accounted for 30% of all independent expenditures on legislative races during a record year for political spending.

“We are proud to see so many Leads backed candidates joining the California Legislature next year, and we aren’t taking our foot off the gas for 2028,” said Nathan Click, a California Leads strategist, in an emailed statement. Click declined to be interviewed and would not comment on the defeat of several Republicans the group had backed, including incumbent Sen. Tony Strickland, Assemblymember Greg Wallis and Ed Musgrove, a candidate for state Senate representing San Diego. 

Mobilizing Economic Transformation Across (Meta) California, a super PAC funded by Meta explicitly to support tech-friendly candidates, spent $2.6 million on five Democratic campaigns for the state Legislature, including three new lawmakers: Assemblymembers-elect Andrae Gonzalez and Annalisa Perea and Sen.-elect Scott Sakakihara, a former executive for Palantir Technologies who received the bulk of that spending. 

While META California’s stated goal is to elect people who will be receptive to “AI innovation,” California Leads and Grow California stress they are not advocating for any issues in particular.

“We’re trying to make a minority of the ideologues on both sides,” said Shaudi Fulp, a political strategist for Grow California.

“Our whole goal is that legislators are not a rubber stamp for any special interest — whether it’s tech, whether it’s public sector labor, whether it’s business.”

Grow California spent extensively in L.A. County’s Senate District 26, the seat vacated by progressive Democratic Sen. María Elena Durazo: $4.6 million to support Democrat Sara Hernandez, an attorney with more moderate positions on healthcare and new development than her Democratic opponent, Sarah Rascón. 

“It was David and Goliath … My Goliath was these outside tech corporate interests.”

Progressive Democratic state Senate candidate Sarah Rascón

Durazo endorsed Rascón, while Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas endorsed Hernandez.

Like Briceño’s, Rascón’s campaign was dwarfed by her opponent’s independent expenditure committees. IEs backed by the California Nurses Association and California Environmental Voters spent $450,000 supporting her; a fraction of Hernandez’s $9 million.

“It was David and Goliath,” Rascón said. “My Goliath was these outside tech corporate interests.”

The environmental advocate said she was inspired to run in part because Durazo was one of the few people willing to take on corporate interests in the Legislature. 

She pointed to Durazo’s Senate Bill 716, which increased the amount local governments could fine property owners who violate health and safety ordinances in non-residential structures. She introduced the bill after a weeklong warehouse fire broke out in June in the working-class L.A. neighborhood of Boyle Heights, sickening hundreds of nearby residents. A coalition of business groups, including the California Chamber of Commerce, opposed the breadth of buildings that could receive a maximum fine and argued the bill could create very large costs for property owners.  

“I think it’s such a shame to lose this seat in a progressive district that was one of the last soldiers holding the line for working people,” Rascón said. 

Hernandez did not respond to a social media direct message and emailed request for comment, but in September she posted an Instagram video explaining how outside money works and saying she was proud her campaign didn’t accept contributions from crypto, big tech, or AI companies, among others.

“If it’s not from me, I didn’t approve it. Don’t rope me in with outside money,” she captioned the video.

The new normal

To some, the specter of new spending by tech interests has been a persistent cause for concern. 

“When they started announcing within the last year that they were going to be spending this money at the state level, that really freaked us out,” said Catherine Bracy, the chief executive of TechEquity Collaborative, a Bay Area nonprofit that advocates for tech industry regulation. She said the new spending is an extension of Silicon Valley’s increasing presence in California lawmaking. 

This fall, her nonprofit’s political advocacy arm, TechEquity Action, began a $1 million statewide ad campaign directing voters to thetruthabouttechmoney.com, which highlighted where the dollars were going statewide. 

“We’ve seen what happens when, for example, Elon Musk spends $450 million on national elections. People do not like it,” Bracy said, referring to Tuesday’s results. 

Still, she acknowledges there is daylight between the different tech backed-entities.  

Larsen, for instance, told KQED in October that he wants the state to “stop all new building” of data centers until there are more regulations on artificial intelligence.

However, his group, Grow California, spent millions to oppose Jackie Elward, a progressive candidate for Marin and Sonoma counties’ Assembly District 12 who said she wanted moratoriums on “anything related to AI.” That district is one of two in which the Grow California-backed candidate, Eric Lucan, was trailing in election returns. 

Sonoma State political science professor David McCuan said in that race, the spending backfired: Early and uncoordinated spending by Grow California and committees backed by real estate and insurance agents increased Elward’s name recognition, and voters’ distaste for tech money followed Lucan, despite his disavowal of it.

McCuan said all the statehouse spending is a strategy by Big Tech to get ahead of a public that’s increasingly skeptical about data centers and artificial intelligence. He expects the spending to grow and become more coordinated in the coming years.  

“Big Tech is trying to preempt what should be a difficult regulatory environment,” he said. 

As for whether the tech industry’s deep pockets will influence new legislators’ votes, UC Riverside political science professor Shaun Bowler said they’ll be a big factor, but not the only one.

“(Lawmakers) don’t just need money, they need to do things that will support the district or help the district,” he said. “One billionaire isn’t the same as 100,000 votes.”