Democrats resist – In California’s competitive race for governor, billionaire Tom Steyer is selling himself as “the billionaire who wants to tax billionaires.” The unusual matchup is pushing Democrats to balance a growing populist appetite for targeting extreme wealth with the p
When ordinary Americans are forced to skip meals to afford healthcare, the debate about billionaires can’t afford to become a pointless moral tangle. It has to land where power actually sits—and where it can be dismantled.
In California’s ultra-competitive Democratic primary for governor, businessman Tom Steyer is leaning into that contradiction. He’s presenting himself as “the billionaire who wants to tax billionaires. ” spending much of his campaign touting the wealthy and corporate opponents who back away from him as proof that he’s a serious threat to the status quo. He’s also emphasized a personal pledge: as he has put it. “I will not die a billionaire. ” saying he and his wife intend to give up most of their money while they’re alive—“(That makes 342 million of us.)”.
Steyer’s pitch is arriving as anti-billionaire sentiment inside Democratic politics becomes harder to ignore. Eighteen percent of Americans say being a billionaire is “morally wrong. ” but that figure is one in three among young people. Over half of American adults now believe billionaires are a threat to democracy. and the public’s anger is increasingly showing up in policy proposals—especially as more blue states consider wealth taxes.
That brings the catch-22 progressives have been circling for years. For democracy to be protected long-term. the political systems that have allowed the ultra-wealthy to exert unlimited financial influence have to be dismantled. The trouble is that those systems don’t usually lose without help from the people who benefit.
The stakes feel personal in a country where wealth inequality isn’t just persistent—it has continued to soar to record highs. The top 1 percent of Americans now hold over 40 percent of the nation’s wealth. and in no other industrialized country is that number greater than 28 percent. There are now roughly a thousand billionaires in America, with a collective net worth of around $6.9 trillion. By comparison, the median American’s wealth now lags behind peers in countries like Australia, Canada, and the United Kingdom.
The political story around wealth inequality has also been shaped by an older tension in American life—one that political analyst Bradford Kane describes as a split personality between “rugged individualists” on one side and “communal collectivists” on the other. Kane argues that in 2016 and 2024. Trump successfully channeled that resentment into a form of faux populism that elevated himself over the masses. Kane also frames Bernie Sanders’ progressive populism as powerful but facing an uphill battle against the Democratic establishment.
The contrast, in this framing, is stark. Trump. approaching what is described as his final midterm election as a historically unpopular president. is said to have dropped any pretense of caring about the economic struggles of everyday Americans. Progressives, by contrast, are said to be running and winning with platforms centered on affordability and inequality.
In places like California. New York. Washington. and Maine. lawmakers are pushing for new taxes on millionaires. ultra-millionaires. billionaires. and owners of pieds-à-terre. The backlash has been immediate from opponents who warn that such taxes will send “job creators” fleeing from liberal states to “DeSantis Country.”.
But the promised exodus hasn’t materialized in the way critics claimed. Nearly six months into the mayoralty of Zohran Mamdani, departure threats from wealthy detractors have proven empty. Massachusetts. too. is held up as a test case: it passed a 4 percent tax on income over $1 million in 2022. and the millionaires “have largely stayed put.” The argument made for the policy’s value is that the state used the new revenue to bolster transportation infrastructure and education. making it easier for young. working families to remain.
In this telling, the only lifestyle change the ultrarich might experience would be giving up a private plane, yacht, or 12th home.
All of that feeds into the question Democrats are being forced to answer—often in real time, often under pressure: Aren’t billionaires people, too?
Yes. But for the people living with the consequences of extreme inequality, that isn’t the decisive point. The more urgent issue is whether the Democratic Party will keep retreating from small-“d” populist policies when the political moment becomes inconvenient. The challenge isn’t to stop talking about wealth. It’s to talk about it in a way that targets the structures that allow extreme wealth to translate into outsized political influence—regardless of who happens to be delivering the message.
Steyer’s role in that debate is framed as more than symbolic. In endorsing him. Robert Reich recalled that “We’ve had wealthy Democratic politicians before.” He pointed to FDR and JFK as examples of leaders with “tremendous fortunes” who enacted “some of the most progressive policies in American history.” The point being made is that Steyer’s willingness to seek higher taxes for himself and his peers is supposed to blunt the idea that wealth-redistribution arguments are only an expression of resentful anger.
Instead, Steyer is portrayed as a credible messenger for calling for disruption of the structures that let billionaires like him consolidate vast sums of money and power.
Even that credibility, however, comes with a warning about what Democrats should expect from the billionaire class. A Bernie Sanders–affiliated PAC called Our Revolution put it bluntly in a tweet endorsing Steyer: “We’ve never endorsed a billionaire—but [he] is using his position to upset the system.”.
Still. Chuck Collins of Inequality.org is cited with a harsher constraint on the strategy: “If we’re waiting for the billionaire class to summon their urgency to step up and solve the pressing problems of our day. we are in trouble.” Extreme inequality. Collins’ point is that it requires mass mobilization. not benevolence. It also argues that elected officials must be more accountable to the public than to big donors.
Higher taxes on the ultrarich and redistributive policies. the argument continues. will always face friction in a nation that long mythologized free enterprise and sky’s-the-limit ambition. But that story has also been selective. The heyday of middle-class America. it’s argued. was mythologized too—while the top federal tax rate was 90 percent. antitrust enforcement was robust. and a third of the workforce was unionized.
For Democrats staring at an electorate that is increasingly skeptical of billionaires and a political structure that is still deeply shaped by money. the question coming from this California race is less about whether billionaires can be part of the conversation. It’s about whether the party will stay committed to the policies that confront the power behind them—and whether it will keep showing up. even when the messenger shares the very label voters are trying to challenge.
Tom Steyer California governor primary Democratic Party billionaires wealth taxes populism inequality Zohran Mamdani Massachusetts 4 percent tax giving pledge Robert Reich Our Revolution