California gubernatorial hopeful Tom Steyer is bringing in operatives who helped propel socialist Zohran Mamdani to New York Metropolis’s mayoralty, in response to a report.
Steyer, the previous hedge fund supervisor and outstanding Democratic donor who waged a failed bid for the social gathering’s nomination for president in 2020, is utilizing the providers of Combat Company, a far-left political consultancy.
The agency is run by veterans of prior campaigns together with these of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.) and Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.).
Rebecca Katz, a accomplice on the agency, as soon as ran the late Sen. Harry Reid’s (D-Nev.) battle room within the US Senate. She additionally helped information communications technique for Supreme Court docket Justice Sonia Sotomayor.
In latest cycles, she was credited with serving to engineer Fetterman’s 2022 Senate victory in Pennsylvania and Gallego’s 2024 Senate win in Arizona — two of the social gathering’s strongest battleground over-performances.
Katz acknowledged she was initially cautious of signing on with Steyer, given the agency’s acknowledged give attention to elevating working-class candidates.
“Once we began Combat, our objective was to get extra working-class candidates elected. He’s not from the working class. I underestimated him, and I didn’t suppose he received it,” she instructed the information website The Bulwark.
Katz stated she finally reversed course after listening to Steyer’s pitch on California’s financial challenges and his proposed cures.
“Is he much like a few of our different shoppers? No, he’s not. However does he perceive the issue, and does he have actual options? 100 f—king %,” she stated.
Katz stated that Steyer is “as clear-eyed on the issues and challenges we have now in America — and California particularly — [as] anybody on the market.”
Steyer’s platform echoes the populist, anti-corporate themes Combat Company has championed in previous rebel campaigns, together with these for Sanders, Fetterman and Mamdani.
He has proposed closing company tax loopholes to fund public faculties, constructing 1 million new houses to handle the housing disaster, breaking apart utility monopolies to decrease electrical energy charges and banning company PAC cash in state elections.
Different companions within the agency have helped carry Democrat upstarts in high-profile races.
Tommy McDonald, a co-founder of Combat Company, has labored on greater than 200 campaigns throughout 30 states, together with serving as lead paid media advisor on Fetterman’s Senate race.
His résumé additionally contains media work tied to Sanders’ presidential bid and impartial candidate Dan Osborn’s Senate run in Nebraska, in addition to a number of Home and statewide contests.
Julian Mulvey, one other co-founder, was dubbed one of many “architects” of Sanders’ 2016 presidential marketing campaign and later produced adverts for Biden and the Democratic Nationwide Committee in 2020.
Morris Katz, who served as lead media strategist on Mamdani’s mayoral marketing campaign, additionally suggested Osborn’s impartial Senate bid and has labored on a spread of rebel and Working Households Get together-backed efforts.
Combat Company has additionally signed on with Graham Platner, the left-wing Democrat trying to beat Maine Gov. Janet Mills for the social gathering’s nomination. Each Mills and Platner are searching for to unseat incumbent Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine).
Whereas particulars of the scope of its work on Platner’s marketing campaign haven’t been publicly detailed, the agency lists him among the many shoppers it has taken on since launching in January of final yr as a part of its effort to again candidates it views as prepared to wage “robust battles” in opposition to the political institution.
The Put up has sought remark from Steyer and Combat Company.
Steyer faces a crowded Democratic discipline within the 2026 gubernatorial contest, together with a number of statewide officeholders and veteran social gathering figures similar to Katie Porter, Xavier Becerra, Eric Swalwell, Tony Thurmond, Betty Yee, and former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa.
His early $27 million self-funded blitz has allowed him to outspend rivals by a large margin.
