The billionaire who wants to be California governor

Tom Steyer must solve this dilemma: How does he convince financially struggling Californians they can trust a billionaire to be their governor? Because, after all, the former hedge fund titan doesn’t exactly share their daily ordeal of scraping up enough money to pay for rent, groceries and gas in the run-down car, according to the Tribune News Service.

And he doesn’t have any record in public office to point to. He’s trying to start his elective career at the top. So, what’s the solution? Well, you can be a global celebrity like super-rich actor Arnold Schwarzenegger when he was elected in 2003. Or a Gold Rush tycoon like Leland Stanford back in 1861. Other than those two, there’s a long list of well-heeled rookie failures.

They include Republican Meg Whitman, who blew $144 million of her fortune losing in 2010. And Al Checchi, who spent $40 million of his own money getting beaten in the 1994 Democratic primary.

“Look, they didn’t have anything to say,” Steyer told me while sipping tea at a popular hangout near the state Capitol, specifically mentioning Whitman and Checchi. “They’d never done anything. Not like I’ve done for 14 years.”

Steyer, 68, who lives in the San Francisco Bay Area, touts his record of funding and promoting progressive causes, including successful ballot campaigns that raised tobacco taxes, closed a major corporate tax loophole and beat back oil industry efforts to kill climate fighting laws.

“I could give you 10 things I’ve done about environmental sustainability and economic justice,” he said.

“Why trust me? Because I’ve gotten results. And I don’t owe anybody anything.”

The Democrat spent $12 million on TV ads last year pushing Gov. Gavin Newsom’s Proposition 50 that allowed the Legislature to gerrymander congressional districts aimed at gaining five more Democratic seats in California.

Being a billionaire allows Steyer to buy all the TV spots he wants. He already has popped for $27 million worth running for governor.

But astronomical wealth comes with a political price.

“California voters do not cotton to some rich guy who has never spent a day in office but looks in the mirror one morning and suddenly sees a governor of California,” says veteran Democratic strategist Garry South.

So, in his campaign TV commercials, Steyer wears casual backyard barbecue garb trying to look like Mr. Average, but with a populist agenda. “I’m the billionaire who’s going to take on the billionaires,” he says.

That sounds counterintuitive, and I’m skeptical about how well it sells.

Steyer knows he sorely needs labor support to seem credible among the working class. That’s why he recently joined rallies for striking teachers in San Francisco and health care workers in San Diego.

He has scored endorsements from the California School Employees Association — a union representing school staff — and the California Nurses Association.

Nurses are backing Steyer largely because he has embraced their No. 1 goal: a single-payer, state-run health insurance system. They’ve attempted to push that in Sacramento for years and failed. And for good reason.

Single-payer would cost the state barrels of money it doesn’t have. Moreover, it would replace not only private insurance, but popular federal Medicare and the state’s Medi-Cal program for the poor. The federal government would need to agree. Fat chance. I asked Steyer whether he really believes the state bureaucracy is capable of handling such an ambitious undertaking. “We’re going to have to get back to having a government that works,” he replied, in what sounded like a knock on Newsom and his predecessors. How could he make a single-payer system work? “God is in the details,” he answered, a phrase he frequently uses. Translation: “I don’t know.”

“We’re going to work through it. That’ll take at least three years... But we’re going to have to do it.... Health care costs have been escalating for a very long time. And they’re eating up the (state) budget.”